


The Never To Be Finished Meningitis-Neal Story

by embroiderama



Category: White Collar
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Angst, Deaf Character, Hurt/Comfort, Illnesses, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-12
Updated: 2014-10-12
Packaged: 2018-02-20 21:36:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 24,392
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2444006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/embroiderama/pseuds/embroiderama
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Neal becomes very sick, and even if he survives his life will never be the same.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Never To Be Finished Meningitis-Neal Story

**Author's Note:**

> This was started years ago, just before season four started airing, so it's AU from that point in that it ignores Neal's gunshot wound and has Mozzi come back a bit later.

As Peter drove across the bridge and Manhattan came into view, Neal leaned his head against the passenger side window and stared. He was overwhelmingly exhausted from the long flight and everything that had come before, but beyond that he couldn't decide quite how he felt. Glad to be back in the city he thought he'd left forever, unhappy to have left Mozzie behind, nervous about going back to work with a whole new set of expectations hanging over him. It was too much to think about, and his head ached as he watched the storefronts and cabs and pedestrians slip past the window. 

He closed his eyes and listened to the bump of tires on asphalt, the mumble of Peter's sports talk radio punctuated by car horns from outside. Just two days earlier, he'd been sitting in an open-air cantina, listening to Latin music playing on a radio, birds calling overhead, children playing, the rhythm of the waves a constant murmur underneath. Everything in New York felt about as real as a 3D movie, but Neal knew he just needed a little time to get his feet steady under him and everything would get back to normal.

"You doing okay over there?" Peter asked, sounding tired himself.

"Yeah." Neal sat up straight and winced at the kink in his neck. There was no such thing as first-class seats when he was flying home in the custody of the FBI, and all those hours squeezed into a coach seat had been torture. "I guess I'm just jet-lagged or something."

"Right. Well, obviously neither of us is in any shape to go to the office today, and it's Friday so that gives you almost three days to get your bearings."

"Three days sounds good."

June's house came into view, and Neal knew what he felt then: gratitude. He'd spoken to June on the phone before they boarded their first flight, and she was happy to have him back. She explained that the apartment was a bit more bare than it had been, as a result of two federal agencies searching the place for signs of where Neal might have gone, but she promised that he'd have a bed with clean sheets, and that was all Neal really cared about. 

Peter pulled into a parking space half a block from June's front door and turned to look at Neal. "Home sweet home."

Neal unbuckled his seatbelt and winced as his sore muscles complained at having to turn around to retrieve his carry-on from the back seat. "You really should try first-class sometime, Peter."

"That's above my pay-grade. And yours, from now on, I hope."

"Of course." Neal nodded and winced again as he pushed the door open and put one foot on the street.

"Are you sure you're okay?"

Neal had missed Peter's ernest concern. "I'm just tired, but I have all weekend to sleep."

"If you think you can wake up for a little while on Sunday, El's been talking about trying the brunch at some restaurant a couple blocks away from here. We could meet you around noon?"

While he was gone, Neal hadn't allowed himself the luxury of missing people, but now he felt a rush of affection for Elizabeth and her habit of always believing in him. And forgiving him. "I'd like that a lot," he said. He wanted to say more, thank Peter for finding a way to bring him home and letting him get back to the life he'd left behind, but he was too tired to find the right words. "Thanks, Peter," was all he managed, and then he stood up and shut the car door behind him.

Neal's lightly-packed carry-on felt like a bag full of rocks as he walked down the block and the ache in his head didn't appreciate the change in elevation as he walked up the steps to June's front door. Before he could knock, June herself opened the door. She drew him inside and then folded him into a gentle hug. "Oh my dear, I'm so glad you found your way home."

Neal swallowed against a swell of emotion. "Thank you for allowing me to be at home here."

"Hush. Now, I was just getting ready to have lunch, and I ordered in some extra sandwiches in case you were hungry. Would you like to join me?"

"Honestly June, I appreciate the offer but I just want to go to bed. I feel like I could sleep for days, and right now that sounds like a good plan."

June made a sympathetic face, then perked up. "Stay right here for just a minute."

Neal obliged her, though he let himself lean against the newel post at the foot of the stairs. He was almost ready to put his head down on the polished wood when June walked back into the foyer.

"You should eat something, so just take these upstairs with you. I had my cook stock a few things in your refrigerator so you should be okay until you're ready to greet the world again." She passed over a cloth-napkin-wrapped bundle then frowned after their hands met. "You feel warm, Neal. You're not getting ill are you?"

She reached out to touch Neal's cheek, but he ducked out of her reach and climbed up the first two stairs. "I'm fine, just tired from the long trip." He held up the wrapped sandwiches and nodded. "Thank you so much."

June didn't look particularly appeased, but Neal was too tired to worry about it. He dragged himself up the stairs and let himself into the apartment, then closed the door behind himself and leaned against it for a moment. Looking around the room, he could see a few missing furnishings, a couple of places where the wall had been visibly patched, but it looked like home. On the table, right about where he'd left his anklet when he ran, were his keys on a keyring with a gold fob--a gift from June, no doubt.

His bed looked like the best spot in the room, and he thought about just chucking the sandwiches in the refrigerator and climbing into bed. He wasn't hungry--his stomach felt slightly unsettled if anything--but he hadn't eaten much during the flights home, and he didn't want hunger to wake him from the sleep he craved, so he decided food would be a good option. He unwrapped the sandwiches and found one roast beef and cheddar and one fresh mozzarella with tomato, so he put the roast beef in the fridge pulled out a bottle of water, and sat at the table to eat his lunch. The flavors of the food failed to awake his appetite, but he worked through the sandwich and water mechanically then folded up the cloth napkin and tossed the empty bottle in the recycling bin under his sink.

He thought about showering to get rid of the funk of traveling, but he didn't have enough energy to care. His clothes were too rumpled to merit much care so he just stripped down to his underwear and boxers, draped the rest of his clothes over a chair, put his phone on the bedside table and climbed into bed. The sheets were soft against his skin, and the gentle rustling sound of them settling around him felt comfortably familiar. Even through his closed eyelids, the afternoon sun was making his headache worse, so he turned his face into the pillow. He breathed in the fresh smell of the fabric softener and listened to the tiny, crisp ticks of his alarm clock as he dropped down into sleep.

~~~

Neal woke to pain, a fierce ache in his head driving him toward wakefulness. Even in the relative darkness, only the glow of street lights illuminating the room around him, the light hurt his eyes, and he pulled the covers back over his face. He tried to figure out what time it was, how long he'd been sleeping, but thinking only made his head hurt worse. His body ached, and he tried to turn over, find a more comfortable position so he could fall back to sleep, but pain shot through him like a sword stuck down through the back of his head to his spine, and his stomach lurched.

Pushing through the pain, struggling against the sweat-damp sheets that were sticking to his legs, Neal got himself out of bed and stumbled across the apartment to the bathroom where he dropped to his knees in front of the toilet. He winced at the impact that traveled from his knees to his head, and then his stomach twisted and he threw up everything he'd eaten, everything inside of him. The movement and the pressure in his head was too much, and in between dry heaves he was sobbing into his arm where he was leaning over the toilet. 

He was terribly grateful that nobody could see him as he flushed and then slowly climbed to his feet. He leaned on the sink, his arms shaking, elbows locked to hold him up and dry-heaved another couple of times until he managed to duck his head down and swallow a few handfuls of water. The water tasted of the stale salt of his skin, but that was better than the bile burning his throat, and he hoped he'd be able to hold it down. He shuffled back through the apartment, his eyes closed against the piercing light from outside, his body stiff and shivering cold, the walk longer than it had ever been before.

When he finally reached the side of his bed, the cold slimy damp of the sheets made his stomach churn again, and he couldn't do it. He couldn't climb inside of that, couldn't even think where the clean sheets would be, couldn't. He thought about just laying down on the floor, but he was too sore, too cold. The sofa wasn't too far away, but by the time he reached it he was utterly exhausted. He wrapped himself in the blanket he kept near the couch and collapsed down onto the upholstery. 

Shivering, he tried to think what could have made him sick, and the only thing he could think of was the tourist restaurant he'd gone to with Peter before leaving the island. Just his luck, the only souvenir he'd managed to bring back was food poisoning. He thought about calling Peter to see if he was sick too, but his phone was over on the bed, much too far away. It was the fish, he thought, and he fell asleep to the thought of water, warm warm water rising to cover his body.

Neal could vaguely remember waking a few times, alternately burning and freezing, seeking cool air or the warmth of the blanket. Then he woke again to horrible, searing bright light flooding in through his windows and cutting through his brain like a steel saw. A glimmer of awareness inside him said _sunset_ , but he couldn't think past the pain in his head, the ache in his body, the high-pitched whine in his ears that wouldn't stop. Wouldn't stop.

His stomach churned again, and he tried to stand up but he found himself on his knees next to the sofa. The room spun around him as he groped for the coffee table and got one foot under him, then the other. He stayed half-bent in deference to the pain in his back and took a step toward the bathroom, but two steps later his legs wobbled, his knees collapsed and he fell into the lazy spin of the floor. His hands broke his fall, but then his chest and stomach hit the floor and he heaved up a mouthful of watery bile.

His head was a muddle of pain and sound and shuddering heat but the single thought, _This is bad, this is very bad_ , rose out of the chaos. Neal pushed against the floor, trying to move, to get to--to something, but his arms were too weak and the dark water rose to claim him again.

\---

The house phone rang while June was drinking her coffee and listening to the Sunday morning jazz program on radio. Saturday had been a busy day, the morning and afternoon spent with her daughter and granddaughter and the evening taken up by a benefit concert she had agreed to attend with a gentleman friend. She had no particular interest in him, but he was an old, old friend and spending time with him was a pleasure. All told, she'd been out of the house from morning to midnight except for an hour in the evening when she'd come home to change into her dress for the benefit. 

She hadn't heard a peep from Neal's room upstairs, but she assumed that he'd woken sometime during the day despite his promise to sleep the whole day through. She planned to give him until mid-morning and then see if she could lure him out with croissants and fresh-squeezed orange juice. She'd missed him more than she expected while he was gone, her words to the FBI people proving closer to the truth than she would have liked, and she hoped to hear some about his adventures since he'd left.

The maid bringing the cordless phone handset to the table broke June out of her woolgathering.

"Peter Burke, ma'am."

"Thank you, Anna." June nodded and accepted the phone then hit the button to unmute the call. "Good morning, Peter."

"Good morning, June," he said in his pleasantly deep voice. "I'm sorry to bother you, but have you seen Neal?"

"Well, I saw him when he arrived Friday afternoon. He took himself straight to bed, and I was out of the house almost all day yesterday so I didn't cross paths with him. Is he expected somewhere?"

Peter sighed; frustration seemed to be a regular state for him, and she hoped that he was keeping an eye on his blood pressure. "Not exactly. We made plans for me and Elizabeth to meet him for brunch at noon, but El has to take care of a few things for an event so I've been trying to call him to reschedule for 2pm. I left him a message yesterday evening and called again this morning, but he's not picking up."

"Oh, dear. He did seem tired though, so maybe he's just deep asleep."

"Maybe. I swear Neal likes making me run around in circles." Peter sighed again. "Would you mind just knocking on his door or something? I'm sure you're right that he's just asleep but I'm driving my dog crazy here. I keep pacing, and he thinks it's time to go for a walk."

June laughed politely. "Certainly. If Neal's asleep I'll wake him up and ask him to call you."

"Thanks, June. I appreciate it."

"You're very welcome." June disconnected the call and put the handset back on the table for Anna to collect. She knew she could just send somebody up to wake Neal, but Peter's worry was contagious, and she wanted to see for herself that Neal was okay.

At the top of the stairs, June knocked on Neal's door. When there was no response, she knocked a bit harder and called out, "Neal? Can you come to the door for a moment?" She waited, and when there was no response after a minute she checked the doorknob and found it unlocked. She didn't hear the shower running, and she hoped he wasn't in the middle of something too personal as she pushed the door open slowly.

Neal was on the floor. It didn't make sense for a moment--what was Neal doing on the floor in his underwear and why hadn't he responded to her?--but then she blinked and hurried to his side. "Oh, Neal," she whispered to herself, "oh please no." She knelt down at his side and put a hand on his back; his skin was warm, and she felt a rush of gratitude that he was alive until she realized that he was in fact far too warm and seemed to be barely breathing. His right arm and leg were both half-bent as if he'd been trying to get up but simply couldn't, and a half-dried pool of liquid gathered near his face.

"Neal?" she said, then again more loudly, "Neal?" She shook his shoulder and called his name again, and finally he responded, moaning and moving his head slightly against the floor. He went still again and didn't respond any further, and June knew he needed help. She didn't have her cellular phone with her, and the house phone was too far away, but she stood and spotted Neal's phone next to the bed. It was displaying a message about the missed calls from Peter, but she ignored those and dialed 911. 

She gave the young woman who answered the call her address and told her where her house sat, and she answered their questions and followed the instructions they gave her, covering Neal with a blanket and tilting his head so he could breathe better. He whimpered like a wounded child, and she took his hand in hers and held it tight. Her heart was in her throat, and she felt ill as she tried not to think of how she'd lost Byron or the other losses she usually let stay in the distant past. She wanted to call Peter back, but the woman from 911 asked her to stay on the line until the ambulance came.

Long minutes later she disconnected the call as she heard heavy footsteps on the stairs. Two young men moved in and started working on Neal as June climbed to her feet to get out of their way. She sank into one of the chairs at the kitchen table, and her hand shook hard enough that she had to take a deep breath and concentrate to find the right entry in Neal's phone to call Agent Burke.

"So you finally woke up," he said in greeting, and June frowned at having to explain the situation.

"Peter, this is June."

He was silent for a moment, and then his voice changed completely from his light, mocking greeting. "June. What's happened?"

"I'm not certain, but Neal's very ill. The paramedics are here, and--"

" _Paramedics?_ What--" She heard footsteps and the jingle of keys. "Tell me everything."

June watched the men word, touching Neal and communicating with each other in medical jargon. "I found Neal lying on the floor, where he seemed to have passed out. He felt like he had a very high fever, and he wouldn't wake up though he made a little noise when I tried to move him."

"Damn it," he muttered. "Okay, I'm on my way. What are the EMTs doing for Neal?"

"They're loading him on on their contraption." Holding the phone away from her face, she stood to get the paramedics' attention. "Excuse me, to which hospital are you taking him?"

The white paramedic glanced up at her and said, "Bellevue," as he continued strapping Neal down. Her blanket had been tossed to the side, and Neal looked terribly vulnerable as they covered him with a scratchy, industrial-looking blanket. She swallowed hard and remembered Peter. "They're taking him to Bellevue," she said. Peter thanked her and promised to meet her there as soon as possible, then hung up, no doubt so that he could be less distracted as he drove like a maniac.

June watched as the paramedics gathered their gear and carried Neal out, clattering slowly down her steps and out the front door. Her driver didn't work on Sundays, and it would take too long to wait for a private car to arrive, so June pulled on her coat and found her purse, and as the ambulance pulled out into traffic, siren blaring, she hailed her own taxicab. June heard her voice shake as she told the driver where to take her, and she knew she sounded old. A frightened old lady.

She damned Neal for making her care so much about him and prayed that he would be okay. He simply _had_ to be okay.

\---

By the time Peter got across the bridge into Manhattan and uptown to the hospital where Neal had been taken, he was ready to start screaming at somebody to find out what was going on. He knew Neal had been tired and a little headachey on Friday, but he'd been tired himself, worn down by the travel and the change in weather and time zone. Throw in the stress of the previous few days, and Peter had been ready to commune with his mattress by the time he got home.

_Everything was supposed to be okay,_ the thought kept looping uselessly through his mind. They'd worked out at least the broad strokes of Neal's legal situation, Peter had his badge back, Neal was home, everything was supposed to be okay. They were supposed to go to brunch on Sunday and to work on Monday, and everything was supposed to be okay. It didn't make any sense that Neal would end up unconscious on the floor of his apartment. Peter hadn't been able to see this one coming, and he really, really hated when he couldn't see things coming.

He was in the middle of waving his badge at the ER's front desk attendant when June appeared at his side. "What's going on?" he asked, hoping June had some kind of concrete information, preferably good news.

"The doctors were already seeing to Neal by the time I got here, and this gentleman has told me that somebody will come looking for us as soon as there's any information."

"But--"

"Now, come help me fill out this paperwork." June took Peter's arm, and he couldn't help following her lead no matter how much he wanted to interrogate the man behind the front desk. She held up a clipboard of forms. "I'm afraid to say that I know very little of this information. I've filled out Neal's name and address, of course, but the rest of it--" She gestured helplessly and handed the paperwork over to Peter as she sat down.

Peter scanned the forms and quickly filled in Neal's employment and insurance information as well as what he knew of Neal's medical history, then took the completed forms back to the front desk. He got the stock answer that somebody would be with them as soon as possible, and he considered storming through the swinging doors to get more information _now_. Only the thought that he might distract the medical staff from taking care of Neal convinced him to sit down with June again.

June was as disheveled as Peter had ever seen her--her hair not so polished, her clothing more casual than her norm--and she looked older as well, anxiety deepening the lines on her face. Peter took a calming breath and kept his voice even as he spoke to her. "Tell me again what happened. Please."

"I knocked on the door, and there was no answer so I stepped inside and he was just...on the floor." She gestured as if Neal were laying at their feet. "His fever was very high, and his breathing seemed to be weak. I think--" She held one hand in front of her lips for a moment, trembling slightly for a few breaths before she continued. "I think he was trying to get help but he just couldn't go any further. I should have checked in on him or asked somebody else to check on him. I can't stand knowing he was so ill inside my own house, and I didn't know it."

As always, Peter felt completely out of his depth when dealing with emotional women. He hadn't called Elizabeth yet because he didn't want to distract her from her work when he didn't even have any solid information yet, but he desperately wished for her to be at his side. "It's not your fault, June. He's a grown man and you had every reason to believe he was just sleeping or resting."

"You didn't see him," she whispered harshly. 

"I'm sorry." Peter wasn't sure what he was apologizing for, but it had served him well as a default statement when dealing with upset people. June patted his hand and then returned to clutching at her purse, and side-by-side they waited in silence.

"Family of Neal Caffrey?"

Peter had braced himself for some twelve year-old doctor version of a probie, but the woman who came out into the waiting area looked like she was about 50, which made him feel just the smallest bit better about the situation. He stood and walked over to meet her, with June at his side. "That's us."

The doctor looked back and forth between them. "I'm Dr. Green, and you are?"

"Peter Burke, FBI." Peter flipped open his badge. "Neal is my consultant, and I hold his medical power of attorney. He's also my friend. This is June Ellington, and Neal...lives with her."

Dr. Green lifted one eyebrow then nodded. "Please come with me so we can have some privacy to discuss Mr. Caffrey's situation."

"Is he--" Peter didn't want to ask if Neal was alive because he couldn't deal with the possibility of the answer being no, but at the same time he needed to know.

"He's in critical condition. Please, we can all sit down in a consultation room, and I'd like to get off my feet for a moment."

Peter nodded, and the doctor turned to lead them through the heavy swinging doors and then into a tiny, nondescript room with a small desk and four chairs inside. The doctor sat down behind the desk, and June immediately took one of the chairs. Peter started pacing but then sat down after a quelling look from the doctor.

"Okay, thank you. Mr. Caffrey came in with a fever of 105° and very low blood pressure, dehydrated and responding only to painful stimuli. We took blood and did a spinal tap, which confirmed that he has meningitis."

Peter knew that wasn't a good thing, but June gasped and put a hand to her mouth again.

"We're running tests to confirm, but I suspect that it is unfortunately bacterial meningitis, and we've already started him on powerful antibiotics along with fluids to rehydrate him and some other medications to hopefully boost his vital signs and reduce his fever. Mr. Caffrey is currently being transferred to the ICU, and I'd like to get as much background on this as possible."

"Of course," Peter said, his voice sounding strange and far away to his own ears.

"Do you know when he started showing symptoms?"

Peter sighed and rubbed at his forehead. "We flew in on Friday, and he was dragging all morning. He had a headache by the time I dropped him off, but I thought it was just jet lag. I didn't know."

"I knew he wasn't feeling well when he got home," June added, "but I didn't see him after that until this morning. I thought he was catching up on his sleep."

The doctor nodded and turned back to Peter. "Where did you fly in from? Do you know if he was exposed to other people who might have been ill?"

"We flew in from Cape Verde, off the coast of Africa, but I don't know much about where he'd been or who he's been around for the past few months. I'm sorry."

"That's okay. When we're done here, I'm going to send in an intern to take down the information about your flight and anybody else Mr. Caffrey may have been around for the past few days because they'll need prophylactic antibiotics. That includes both of you; we don't need more people getting sick."

"Of course," June answered.

Peter really didn't want to talk about administrivia. "Is he going to be okay? Can you tell us that?"

The doctor glanced down at the chart on her desk and then looked back up at Peter, her face unsmiling. "Unfortunately, I can't give you a great deal of reassurance. From the history you've given me, it sounds as if Mr. Caffrey's been symptomatic for about 48 hours. That's far from ideal because it means the bacteria have had quite a bit of time to cause damage to his brain and central nervous system, and the fever has had time to make his body very weak."

Peter felt his mouth go dry, his stomach tense and sick. "But he's only 34, and he's always been so healthy. At least as long as I've known him."

"His previous good health is a point in his favor. We're going to give Mr. Caffrey the best treatment available, but he's going to need strength, and he's going to need luck. Once he's settled in the ICU, we'll allow limited visitation, and I encourage you as well as any other family members to use that time to support him."

Peter nodded silently, not sure what to say, not sure he could say anything through his tight, dry throat.

"Thank you, Dr. Green," June said, and Peter coughed out, "thanks," to echo her.

"You're welcome." The doctor stood and picked up Neal's chart. "I'll have an intern in here shortly to get that information, and then he can direct you to the ICU waiting room."

Peter felt numb. He knew he should be talking to June, supporting her, but he didn't know how. He'd sat through discouraging talks from doctors before his father died, but he'd been forty years older than Neal and had smoked since he was fifteen. Peter hadd sat waiting for news when fellow agents were injured, but it had never been anybody he was especially close to. He had a few scary hours when El got sick a few years into their marriage, but they took her appendix out, and she came home the next day with two band-aids on her stomach and some Vicodin that made her high as a kite.

Nobody had ever said that she needed luck.

The intern, who did in fact look like somebody's bag boy, came in and took down the information about the airline and flight number, the other places they'd been. He and June took the antibiotic pills they were offered, and Peter didn't know if the metallic tang in his mouth was the pills or the fear. They followed the doctor kid to the elevators and up to a waiting room full of upholstered vinyl chairs in soothingly pastel colors. He promised that somebody would come talk to them when Neal was ready for visitors and then left them alone.

June sank unsteadily into a chair, and Peter sat next to her for a few seconds before standing up again. "I'm gonna go out. In the hall." He gestured toward the door. "Call El."

In the hall, he took a deep breath and dialed his wife.

"Hi, Hon!" she said, her voice bright and happy to hear from him.

Peter breathed through his nose to push back the burning in his eyes. "Hon."

"W-what's wrong? Something's wrong."

"It's Neal. He's sick." The words ached as they vibrated through his throat. "Meningitis."

"Oh my god." El was silent for a moment, and Peter could almost see her closing her eyes, pulling herself together. "Okay, what hospital?"

"Presbyterian. June and I are in the ICU waiting room."

"Oh no. Okay. I'll be there in twenty minutes."

"Thank you."

Peter ended the call and dropped the phone back in his pocket, then just leaned against the wall. Leaned and closed his eyes and breathed.

~~~

By the time a nurse came out to tell them that Neal was settled, El had arrived, and Peter had managed to let go of her only long enough for El to give June a hug. Having El next to him, her hand in his, Peter felt like he could be calm, like he could deal with whatever came next. The nurse would only allow one person back to see Neal, and Peter reluctantly let go of El's hand so that he could follow the woman in scrubs back through another set of heavy doors. He tried to keep his eyes straight ahead, not wanting to intrude on the privacy of the people in the cubical-like rooms they passed, but then the nurse led him into one of the small rooms, and he couldn't look anywhere but at Neal.

He was surrounded by machinery--a monitor displaying his heart rate and another monitor he didn't recognize, a large, complicated-looking IV stand with multiple lines leading down into Neal's arms, an oxygen mask partially obscuring his face. And Neal-- _his body_ , Peter thought, then pushed it away because Neal was still alive, still a person, not a body--Neal was almost unrecognizable. 48 hours before, Neal had looked tired and uncharacteristically rumpled, a little washed out under his island tan, nothing that didn't characterize the majority of people coming home from a long trip. Now, the remnants of the tan looked like artificial coloring over top of pale, grayish skin, and the lines of his face were drawn and thin--thinner than usual.

Neal usually outshined his surroundings, whatever they were, and now he looked shrunken and reduced by everything around him. His forehead was tight with pain, and when Peter reached his hand out tentatively to touch him he felt the fever searing through his skin and drew his hand back, worried that Neal was too fragile to be touched. He wrapped his hands around the plastic barriers on the side of the bed and just stared at Neal, watching him breathe and listening to the steady beat of his heart rate.

"Neal," he said, feeling like it was futile but hoping he could reach his friend on some level. "You can fight this. We just got you back, and you can't run on me again, not like this. You've got to--"

"Excuse me, Mr. Burke?"

Peter looked over to see a forty-something man in a doctor's coat standing in the doorway. He nodded. "I'm Peter Burke."

"I'm sorry for the circumstances, but it's good to meet you. I'm Dr. Khan, and I'm Neal's neurologist." He held out a hand, and Peter forced himself to let go of the railing and reach his own hand out to shake. "Neal needs to rest, and I'd like to discuss his care with you."

"Okay," Peter said, leaning against the side of Neal's bed.

"Not in here, please. Are there any other family members present?"

"Um, my wife and his friend June. We're his family."

"Okay. Well, let's find the ladies and find a more appropriate place to talk. You'll be able to take turns visiting briefly with Neal later on."

Peter didn't want to walk away, but he didn't have much of a choice. He looked at Neal again, lightly touched the too-warm skin of his arm, then followed the doctor back through the rows of cubicles and out into the main hallway.

A few minutes later, in a quiet corner of the waiting room, Peter listened as the doctor laid out the possibilities for Neal's future like a hand of cards face down on the table.

"Right now, Neal's condition is stable, and our job right now is to give him enough support to keep him fighting until the antibiotics are able to do their job. Right now, he's doing okay on the oxygen mask but we may still have to intubate him if his blood oxygen levels don't stay up. I do believe that Neal can survive this infection, but what we won't know until he wakes up--assuming he does wake up--is what damage may have been done."

"You're saying Neal may be brain damaged?" June asked, her words sharp.

"Possibly, though it may be that the deficits won't impact his intellectual abilities. Some patients experience headaches or emotional difficulties, but in Neal's case I'm particularly concerned about his hearing. His eyes are responding to light, and he's responding to other painful stimuli so he does have some level of awareness. However, he's not responding to sounds at all."

"How can you be sure?" Peter felt sick at the thought of Neal, a man who reveled in the sensory world, losing a part of that.

"We can't, and it's possible that if there is some damage to his hearing that it could reverse itself over a period of time. However, I want to be honest with you. While I am optimistic about Neal's overall recovery, I'm _very_ concerned about his hearing. The infection was untreated for some time, and he's unfortunately in a high-risk population for hearing loss in this situation."

"What high-risk population?" El asked, and Peter tightened his arm around her.

"The same one you're a part of, Mrs. Burke. People with light eyes."

"Excuse me?" Peter shook his head.

"We don't entirely understand the reason for this, but people with light eyes are approximately six times more likely than people with dark eyes to suffer hearing loss from meningitis. An additional risk factor is that one of the antibiotics we need to use can cause hearing loss."

"Aren't there other antibiotics you can use?" Peter had liked Dr. Khan, but now he was starting to think they needed to find another doctor. "Why would you use one with that kind of side-effect?"

"Because it has the greatest likelihood of helping Neal to survive the next few days. I understand your concern, and if we'd been able to begin treatment a day or so ago we'd be able to try another drug, give it several hours to see if it would work, but we don't have any second chances here. We need to go in with the big guns."

"Hon, it's not his fault," Elizabeth whispered in Peter's ear.

"In addition, I'm not willing to risk Neal's life for the chance of saving something that I do believe may already be lost. I know that's not what you want to hear, and I'm very sorry, but in my experience if he could hear he would showing some response to his name being called. If he wakes up unable to hear, Neal's going to need your support so I find it beneficial for the patient's family to have time to prepare."

"We will be prepared," June said, her voice firm. "Thank you, Dr. Khan."

Peter shook the doctor's hand, and then the three of them were alone again in their corner of the room. Peter's stomach growled, startling him, and when he looked at his watch he couldn't believe it was mid-afternoon. In a sense, he felt like it should still be morning, and in another sense it felt like days had gone by since he sat at the table in his pajamas and left voicemail for Neal. Voicemail that Neal would never hear, if the doctor was right.

"Oh wow, I didn't realize it was so late," El said, stealing the thoughts right out of his brain the way she so often did. "We need to organize things here. Neal's not--" El bit her lip as tears gathered in her eyes then took a deep breath and continued. "Neal's going to be here for a while, and we can't all sit in this room until we pass out."

Peter looked over at June, sitting stiffly in her seat. "June, I'm sure you're not going to be comfortable staying here all day. If you want to go home, I'll call you as soon as there's any news."

June was quiet for a moment before responding. "I think I'll go home for a while, then come back this evening. I trust I'll be able to get a turn visiting Neal then?"

"Of course. Are you okay getting home on your own?"

June raised one sculpted eyebrow. "I'm quite capable of calling for a car, Peter Burke."

"I--I didn't mean--" Peter stuttered, flustered.

"I know." June stood and then bent and pressed a light kiss to Peter's cheek. "You make sure that boy knows he's not alone."

"Yes, ma'am." Peter watched as June walked out, regal as always if a bit slower than usual from hours in uncomfortable hospital chairs. He turned to look at El who gave him one of the small smiles he loved, even if he wished he could take away the worry behind it. "Are you leaving me next?"

"I think I should, Hon, but first I'm going to get you something to eat from the cafeteria. Then I'll go home and check on Satchmo and come back in some more comfortable clothes." She gestured at her skirt suit and heels. "We're going to have to come up with some kind of schedule because you can't just live here, Hon."

"I think I could."

"Well, I won't let you. You know, it feels so strange that Mozzie isn't here."

"He had his reasons for going his own way, but if I could contact him I would."

"I know. Okay, food for you and then food for my other boy." She stood and Peter followed, keeping his arm around her. "You'll call me if anything changes?"

"I promise." 

El pulled Peter into a hug, her arms warm and tight around his waist, her words quiet in his ear, "He'll be okay. He'll be okay." Peter had to hope that she would be as right as she usually was.

~~~

Peter waited. He wolfed down the sandwich and chips El brought him, and he watched the news on the muted television in the corner, and he waited. Peter had never been a big fan of waiting, but he'd worked on cultivating patience, and stake-outs were almost pleasant, sometimes. But a stake-out had the potential to end at any time in a bust or a chase or just the end of a shift. This, waiting to be able to see Neal again, wouldn't end in six hours or eight or twelve.

It wouldn't end anytime soon--unless something terrible happened that Peter didn't even want to contemplate. He'd faced the possibility of losing Neal to Collins on Cape Verde, but he'd confronted that with investigation and with action. There was nothing he could do now except sit and try not to lose his mind.

When he finally got to see Neal again, Neal shaking with fever. His face was drawn in pain or fear, his lips forming silent words, and Peter felt utterly unprepared to deal with it. He thought about turning around, walking out, running the hell away from the whole mess, but he couldn't do it. Wherever Neal was in his head, it wasn't anywhere he should be alone.

Neal looked too weak to fight the nightmares in his head, much less the bacteria in his body; he was thinner, already, than he'd been in Cape Verde, the bone structure of his face too apparent. Conscious of how little time he had to visit, Peter leaned against the side of the bed and focused on keeping his voice steady. "I know you can come through this, Neal. After all that work to get back to New York, you can't leave again." _I won't allow it,_ he added in his head.

"Darlin'?"

Peter looked up to see a nurse standing in the doorway, though why a woman younger than Neal was calling him pet names he had no idea. "Is it time for me to leave already?"

"Not yet." She walked in and checked the numbers on the machines hooked up to Neal. "Did the doctor talk to you about his hearing?"

"Yes." And of course Peter had been talking to a man who supposedly couldn't hear him. "I don't know what else to do other than talk to him."

"If you want to let him know you're here, you might try touching him." She raised one eyebrow. "Just steer clear of the wires, and you won't hurt him, darlin', I promise."

Peter considered the legality of arresting her for calling a federal agent _darlin'_ , but then she said, "Why don't you stay a little longer, see if he calms down any," and Peter forgave her for everything.

She left, and Peter tried to figure out where he could touch Neal without interfering with anything. His hands and forearms were occupied with tubes and wires, more wires were attached to his forehead, and a cooling blanket was draped over his torso. Neal looked like some kind of damaged cyborg, and that was completely wrong for a man who was more often _hyper_ alive, more awake than anybody else.

Peter reached out, feeling like he was doing something wrong despite the nurse's instructions, and cupped his hand around Neal's bicep, near the curve of Neal's shoulder. Under the clammy, too-hot skin, he could feel muscle and bone, the evidence of Neal's strength. "Come on, Neal," he whispered, for himself if nothing else. He gently squeezed Neal's arm, then just held on. He rubbed his thumb back and forth in a shallow arc over Neal's skin and hoped that some part of Neal knew he wasn't alone.

The nurse returned after several minutes and checked the readings again. "His heart rate is lower, darlin', you're doing a good job."

"It was too fast?"

"A little, but we're keeping a close eye on him. Why don't you stay with him for a while. I'm liking anything that helps him right now."

That sounded uncomfortably like, _he needs all the help he can get_ , but Peter just nodded. He squeezed Neal's arm again and looked up to study the displays of the machines attached to Neal. If he was going to be there, he wanted to be able to understand what the hell was going on.

Fifteen minutes later, Neal was trembling with chills, and Peter was getting ready to reluctantly step away from him to get the nurse's attention when she came back into the room. "His heart rate and his temperature are both up. Should somebody be doing something?"

The nurse frowned as she checked the monitors and then took Neal's blood pressure. She hit a button and said, "Janel, get one of the docs in to room twelve," then looked up at Peter. "Sir, you're going to have to go back to the waiting room now."

Peter shook his head and kept his hand wrapped around Neal's shoulder. "I don't think so. What's going on?"

"We're going to do our best to help your friend, but you need to give us space to work."

"No, I should be--"

"Out. Now." 

Peter knew a command when he heard one, and he let go of Neal, feeling like he was abandoning Neal when he needed help most. A young doctor Peter didn't recognize and another nurse came bustling into the room and Peter backed out into the hallway. He couldn't see Neal for all the people surrounding him, and he didn't want to cause a problem by loitering in the hall so he turned and walked back to the waiting room. He sat down, shaking, and when he put his hand to his face he realized it was still damp with sweat from Neal's arm.

~~~

It felt like a long time before anybody came out to find Peter, and when the doctor finally appeared looking tense and worn Peter was suddenly sure that he was going to be told that Neal had died. Or was dying. His heart clenched up in his chest, and he squared his jaw, and when the doctor said, "He's still fighting," Peter felt tears burn in his eyes.

He sniffled a little to push back the sensation and nodded. "What's happening?"

"Neal is showing signs of septic shock, which is very dangerous, but we're treating it aggressively. We're increasing his fluids and giving him medications to increase his blood pressure, and his vital signs are looking better. He have to keep a close eye on the pressure around his brain to make sure we don't push him too far in the other direction. His fever has actually come down in the last hour--just a little bit, but this is a positive sign that the antibiotics are helping."

"Is there anything else that can be done?"

"We're doing everything we can right now. Our job is to support Neal's vital functions while the antibiotics and his immune system fight the infection. There are of course no guarantees, but I believe that he will be able to beat the infection as long as we can keep him out of shock and watch the rest of his symptoms."

"And you can do that?"

"We're using every resource available to us."

The doctor's reply wasn't the same thing as a yes, but Peter knew he wasn't going to improve anything by pressing the doctor further. "Can I sit with him again?"

"A nurse will come get you when they're ready."

"Thank you." Peter shook the doctor's hand then went out to walk up and down the hallway while he called El to pass on the news.

When Peter was allowed back in Neal's cubicle in the ICU, little had changed. Peter stood for a moment looking at Neal's face--drawn and tense, not even a placid calm of unconsciousness. Then again, as much as Peter didn't want to think about Neal being in pain, the idea that he was in there fighting sounded like a good thing. It was awkward, but Peter reached around and gentle repositioned Neal's arm until he could slip his hand under Neal's and wrap his fingers around Neal's palm, avoiding the IV and the oxygen clip. He put his other hand on Neal's head and closed his eyes.

He didn't really believe in God, not the way he had as a child, but just for the moment he let himself pretend. He let himself pray that all of the uniqueness that was Neal Caffrey would survive this, that his intellect and spirit would be spared. The thought of Neal never being able to hear again was like a knife in the ribs, but Neal could survive that. He was clever and adaptable, and Peter would help. A lot of people would help. _Just let him survive_ , Peter begged, _we can work out the rest._

\---

Twelve hours later, Elizabeth Burke was sitting in the chair next to Neal's bed, keeping a hand on his arm though she doubted he was aware enough to know. According to what the doctors had told Peter, Neal was holding on--stable, even if his condition hadn't improved much--but it was difficult to believe that when he looked barely alive. Multiple IV lines and other tubes were connected to him, along with a number of monitors, and while they hadn't had to intubate him yet that morning the doctor had replaced the ordinary oxygen mask with a more complicated mask to assist his breathing.

It made El's own chest ache to think that Neal couldn't breathe well on his own, to think that he could have stopped breathing up there in his apartment alone. If Neal had died like that, Peter never would have been the same; nothing would have been the same. And now Neal was still so sick, fever baking through his skin, shaking his body. El squeezed his arm gently and whispered, "You're going to be okay. You're going to be okay."

Even if he couldn't hear the words, she needed to hear them herself. Soon, Peter would be back, and he would need those words too. She just had to be strong enough to say them.

The afternoon passed slowly, but El had promised to stay and she couldn't stand the idea of leaving Neal all alone, even when she was only as close as the waiting room. When Peter returned, he looked exhausted, his face drawn, and he somehow looked rumpled even though his suit was relatively fresh. She stood to greet him, and he pulled her close without a word. She felt his breath in her hair as he sighed. "Any news?"

"He's the same."

Peter nodded and leaned his forehead on hers for a moment before straightening. "Thanks, hon."

El reached up and put her hand on Peter's cheek. "Did you get any sleep at all?"

Peter shrugged. "I fell asleep after I took a shower, but then they called me in to work. They're trying to--I had to go. I don't know what's going to happen there, and I'm making an effort to care but with Neal--"

"I know. Maybe they'll let you go see him. Try?"

"Yeah." Peter went off to talk to a nurse then followed her down the hallway. When he returned ten minutes later, he looked more worn than he had before, and El took his hand as he slumped into the seat next to her.

"What happened?"

"Nothing, really, but his fever's not going down the way they want it to." He took a long shuddering breath in and let it out slowly. "I don't know how much longer he can take this."

There wasn't anything to say, so El just rubbed her hand across the broad plane of Peter's back as he looked around the empty waiting room.

"I'm scared," he whispered. "Hon, I have to tell you something." Peter turned in his seat, and she could see the fear in his eyes.

"Did they tell you something else?"

"No. No, it's not that. It's me. It's--you know I love you."

El swallowed through her suddenly tight throat. "Of course."

"I just--" Peter put one hand over his mouth and shook his head as he looked away. El held her breath until he dropped his hand and looked back at her. "I love him, too. I'm sorry honey, I love him too." Peter didn't look away, just sat there with his face looking like he thought the world was about to end.

El felt her heart break, but not because Peter loved Neal. "Oh hon, I know. It's okay. I know. I've known."

His lips trembled and he tried to clench his jaw but a sob got through despite him. El put a hand on his shoulder and tugged him down until he was halfway laying across the seats with his head in her lap. She pet his hair as he shook, and when she spoke she kept her voice quiet and slow. "I love him, too. I don't know if I love him the same way you do, but I do know you have enough love for both of us. You have for a long time now." 

Peter nodded his head against her thighs.

"Have you ever told him?"

"No. Not--not like that."

"He's going to need you. It's up to you what you want to do, what you want to tell him, but Neal being part of our lives? That's something that sounds good to me."

"I love you," Peter murmured, sounding halfway toward sleep.

"I love you, too. Come on, stretch your legs out and get a little sleep while you can."

Peter pulled his long legs up to rest on the row of seats and sighed as he relaxed. El bit her lip to hold back the tears as she thought, _Please, please don't make us have to learn how to live without you._

When Peter woke and sat up a few hours later, he had lines on his face from the creases in El's skirt but he also looked like he'd gotten a second wind. After making sure he got dinner, El confirmed that June would be arriving to sit with Neal the next morning and then reluctantly left to go home. No matter how concerned she was about Neal and Peter, she still had a dog at home who needed attention, she still had a major event to manage the next day, and she needed to get some sleep. She let Satchmo sleep on the floor in the bedroom, and she fell asleep hoping that the next day would bring better news.

\---

In the evening, the comings and goings of the doctors and other staff decreased, and the nurses let Peter sit next to Neal's bed for most of the night. They were still checking on him frequently, but Peter had learned enough to be able to read some of the monitors, and as the night passed he saw that Neal's temperature was slowly drifting downward--still too high but not frighteningly so as it had been before--and his breathing seemed easier, his oxygen levels higher. A young doctor came in to check on Neal, and Peter moved out of the way but didn't leave the room.

"He's improving?" Peter asked.

The young woman seemed distracted as she nodded but then she looked up and smiled when she made eye contact. "Yes, his vitals are much better. After Dr. Khan evaluates him in the morning, I think he'll be transferred to Critical Care."

"And that's...good?"

"He's stable and improving. It's a very good sign. We've decreased his sedation so he may wake up at some point, but don't expect too much right away, okay?"

"And his hearing?"

"He'll be evaluated by a specialist once he's more responsive."

That was a non-answer if Peter ever heard one, but he didn't think that interrogating an intern was going to get him anywhere. "Okay, thank you."

After the doctor left, Peter drifted off to sleep in the chair with his hand on Neal's shoulder, and he managed to avoid waking up all the way until he was forced to leave before morning rounds began. In the waiting room, Peter found June and passed on the tentative good news before heading home to see El for a few minutes then shower and change again. He had another meeting to attend, and as much as he wanted to focus on Neal he also wasn't prepared to throw away his career.

The result of the meeting--temporary reassignment to the evidence warehouse--was less than ideal but also less dire than some of the other possible outcomes. With any luck, he would be back to the White Collar division by the time Neal was able to return to work. Peter didn't have any idea how long that process would take or what the particular challenges might be, but now that Neal's condition was improving Peter wasn't willing to consider any other possibility. Neal would wake up, Neal would recover, and Neal would return to finish his time as a CI with or without his hearing.

Several people had passed on good wishes for Neal's recovery, and Peter had shared the news that he was improving, but nobody other than he, El and June knew what the doctor had said about Neal's hearing or any of the other details about his illness. Peter wasn't sure what the possible ramifications might be in regards to Neal's deal, but he would be damned if he let anything happen to Neal. Anything worse than had already happened.

Neal was so heart-breakingly vulnerable right then, and Peter ached to wrap him up and protect him from all comers. He wanted to take Neal home and get him well and keep him safe, but he knew the time for that was yet to come. He knew, realistically, that the time for that would probably never come, that Neal would never allow it, but El's acceptance gave him hope. Since Neal still had to recover, still had to even open his eyes, Peter allowed himself to cling to that hope; there was little else he could do.

El was busy all day, but Peter checked in with her by phone then picked up lunch before heading back to the hospital. June had left Peter a message with Neal's new room number, and when she met him in the hallway she surprised him by smiling and taking his hands. "Neal is starting to wake up."

"What? Already?" Peter felt sick that he had missed being there when Neal woke up.

June squeezed his hands then let go. "Just barely. He opened his eyes a little, and I think he saw me. He gave me a bit of a sleepy smile and started to say my name, but then he fell right back to sleep."

"But he could see? And he recognized you?" Peter's throat felt tight, and he leaned against the wall as a wave of dizzy relief washed over him. "Oh, thank god."

"They say they'll have more tests once he's properly awake, but it's a good sign. A very good sign."

"Thank you, June. Are you going to stay this afternoon?"

"I--well, I had better head home, but please do call me if anything changes. I'll be back here tomorrow morning."

"Thank you. I know Neal will be glad to have you here."

"It's the least I can do." June looked troubled as she said that, but before Peter could ask her anything else she left.

Peter went in to Neal's new room then, and was relieved to find him hooked up to a somewhat reduced amount of equipment. He had an IV in one arm now rather than both and a normal oxygen cannula rather than the bulky mask that had assisted his breathing. His fever was down another degree, and as Peter watched he shifted slightly on the bed and his eyelids fluttered without opening. "Neal?" Peter asked, then he sighed at himself and carefully took Neal's hand.

Neal didn't wake up, but he seemed calmer with the physical connection so continued holding his hand until he got tired of standing. He let go just long enough sit down and pull out the mini tablet El had loaned to him, and then he held the tablet in one hand and rested his other hand on Neal's arm. _Please wake up,_ he thought, and he was determined to stay until Neal did just that.

Peter was reading through emails one-handedly, and he almost dropped the tablet entirely when he felt Neal's arm jerk under his hand. Peter stood, fumbling to put the tablet down, and watched as Neal scrunched up his face and reached blindly for the oxygen cannula. "Hey, no," Peter said as he captured Neal's hand and hit the call button with his other hand. Neal went still for a moment, and he started to open his eyes but he shut them quickly, his face pained. A nurse entered the room behind Peter and dimmed the lights, and Peter gently squeezed Neal's hand.

"Come on, try again," he murmured, even if Neal probably couldn't hear, and Neal did try again. He opened his eyes slowly, and his gaze caught on Peter for a few seconds before he looked around the room, confusion and discomfort clear on his face. "Neal?" Peter tried while Neal was looking away, but there was no response.

Slowly, Neal shifted his gaze back in Peter's direction. "Peter?"

Peter wanted to cheer--Neal could see and remember and speak--but Neal frowned, looking more confused than he had been.

"Pe-Peter?" he repeated more loudly then shook his head and winced.

Peter squeezed Neal's hand between both of his. "It's okay," he said clearly, hoping Neal might be able to make out the shape of the words. "It's okay."

Neal started breathing faster, panic gasps that were taxing his exhausted body and making the heart monitor race, and the nurse moved quickly to replace the cannula with a regular mask. "PETER!" he shouted through the plastic as he batted weakly at the nurses hands, and Peter didn't know what to do as the nurse injected something into his IV. Neal relaxed then, and the look of horror left his face as he slipped back into sleep or unconsciousness.

"It's okay," Peter repeated. "It's okay." He really hoped it would be.

\---

Neal woke slowly, unsure where he was, and he lay still as he tried to figure out his situation. Wherever he was, it was very quiet, only a very small hum in the background, like a large piece of machinery that was several floors away. Neal could feel a soft surface below him and light covers over him, and the antiseptic smell made him think of a hospital, but how could a hospital be so quiet? How could--

Neal remembered Peter's face, Peter's mouth moving soundlessly, his own voice missing as he tried to say Peter's name, and he pushed away the thought of the nightmare. Neal shifted just enough to feel that he wasn't tied down, and when he opened his eyes light stung and splintered in his vision but then he squinted and the light-framed shape in front of him resolved into Peter.

Peter gave him a small smile. "Peter?" Neal asked, but just like in the nightmare there was no sound. "No," Neal said, dreading being stuck in the same nightmare, and again his own voice was gone as if sucked into the giant humming void that lurked somewhere out of sight. The light dimmed until it didn't hurt anymore, and Peter patted his shoulder then held up a rectangular white object. A whiteboard?

Neal blinked until the writing became clear. **Neal, you're going to be okay. Please nod if you understand.**

Neal nodded hesitantly.

Peter nodded back and turned the whiteboard around to a different message. **You're at Bellevue. You were very sick, but you're getting better.**

Sick, Neal could believe that. His head ached, and his whole body felt sore and weak. Already, he felt like he was ready to go back to sleep. Or was he asleep already? He couldn't quite understand. "Can't hear anything," Neal said.

Peter nodded, looking calm but sad.

"You hear me?"

Peter nodded again and took Neal's hand. Neal pulled his hand away though it felt like a ridiculous effort. Peter held up a new message. **Rest. We'll talk more later. You won't be alone.**

_You won't be alone._ Neal didn't know why that felt like the best thing to know, a fact that he could curl up with and stay warm, but he closed his eyes while he thought about it and drifted into another dream.

The next time Neal woke he felt hands on his body--hands where there shouldn't be hands--and he opened his eyes and moved away as far as he could as quickly as he could which was not very. His heart was racing, his breath aching in his chest, his neck and back in pain from the sudden movement. He felt a hand on his arm and looked over to see Elizabeth Burke standing next to him and a younger woman, a nurse in purple scrubs, near the end of the bed. Both women looked startled, but then Elizabeth smoothed her shock into a kind smile. She took his hand and squeezed it lightly then reached for something. The whiteboard.

**I'm sorry. The nurse didn't mean to scare you.**

"Elizabeth," Neal said, testing, and once again his voice was gone. Inspiration hit, and Neal knocked on the edge of the bed. No sound. He took the pen from Elizabeth's fingers and tapped it on the whiteboard. No sound. He clicked his teeth together and felt the impact. No sound. Nothing.

His heart pounded as he took the whiteboard and fumbled the cap from the marker, and his hand shook as he tried to write. He felt sick at the words in front of him, but he turned the board around. **AM I DEAF?**

Elizabeth frowned, her beautiful face tragic. Finally, she nodded.

Neal felt something in his chest break open, and he shook his head. He underlined the last word he had written and added two more question marks then tapped the marker on the board. Elizabeth took the board and marker and wrote in the blank space below before handing it back.

**Your doctor will be in soon, and Peter will be back soon too. Try to rest.**

Neal wanted to ask more, write more, but his arms felt so heavy, his whole body exhausted and his brain sore. El put her hand on his forehead, and the soft, cool touch felt good. Neal closed his eyes, and sleep took him.

The next time Neal woke, he remembered before he opened his eyes. He felt a bump against the side of his bed and looked up to see Peter standing there with a doctor next to him. The doctor adjusted the bed to help Neal sit a little bit closer to upright then held out the already annoying whiteboard. **Mr. Caffrey, I'm Dr. Khan, your neurologist. Would you like your friend to be in here while we discuss your condition?**

Neal looked at Peter then shook his head, wincing at the ache in his neck. Peter nodded evenly then squeezed Neal's shoulder and left. Neal swallowed hard then formed words in his mouth and tried to ignore the surrealness of not hearing himself speak. "What happened to me?"

The doctor wrote some more then handed the whiteboard back. **You are recovering from bacterial meningitis. Do you know what that means?**

Neal nodded then paused and tilted his hand back and forth. _Sort of._

**It's an infection of the brain and spinal cord. You were very ill, and you're still sick but you're doing much better.**

Neal opened his mouth, but he found he didn't want to say the words so he held a hand out for the whiteboard and marker. **Will my hearing return?**

The doctor's eyes were sad but kind as he handed back the board. **I'm sorry, I don't believe you will have any significant improvement in your hearing.**

Neal's stomach dropped, and he closed his eyes. The world dropped away, and he couldn't her his own breaths but he could feel them scraping roughly in his throat. When the panic receded, Neal opened his eyes expecting to be alone but the doctor was still there, patiently waiting. "Sorry," Neal said.

**Your feelings are completely normal. Tomorrow, we'll be doing some tests to determine how you're doing neurologically, and your hearing will be tested as well. We're also going to get you out of bed at some point so you need to rest.**

Neal nodded; he was exhausted again, already.

**Do I have your permission to discuss your condition with your friends?**

Neal hesitated but finally nodded. Peter would need to know.

The doctor left then, and Peter came back in to the room. He reached for the whiteboard, but Neal didn't want to talk anymore so he closed his eyes. He thought about asking Peter to leave him alone for a while but he was plenty alone in the silent darkness, and something about Peter being out there made it feel safe to stop fighting the weariness that pulled at him.

The next time Neal opened his eyes, the lights in the room were very dim and the light coming in from outside looked like dawn. Nobody was in the chair next to his bed, but Neal felt a presence in the room with him and a familiar shape stepped out of a shadow. "Moz?"

Mozzie walked closer and moved his hands, and Neal blinked for a moment before remembering the French sign language they had taught themselves for a long-ago heist. [Mon frere.]

[You heard,] Neal signed sloppily.

[June got in touch.]

Neal just nodded. His head ached, and couldn't think what to sign.

[Suit getting coffee. See you later.] Mozzie slipped back into the shadows and out the door, and Neal let himself drift, knowing that the day would start soon. He forced himself out of his haze for long enough to thank Peter for being there and for Peter to tell him that visitors had been asked to stay away until late afternoon to allow for Neal to be evaluated. 

Alone again, Neal lay in bed half-awake, watching the shadows lighten on the ceiling and listening to the nothingness that he could hear. He started to feel like he was underwater, floating an inch above the seabed, held down by the unthinkable weight of all that water, looking up at a world that was far away, uncertain. There would be sounds above the water, but the water holding Neal down insulated him, isolated him. He didn't know if he could swim.

When the Dr. Khan got his attention, Neal startled, breathed wrong, and felt for a moment that he was choking until the doctor helped him sit up and get his breath back. That episode seemed to inspire a round of listening to his lungs, cold metal on his back and chest. Neal played along with the rest of the neurologists tests, pushing at her hands with his hands and then his feet and performing other small, simple tasks. Most of them seemed easy, and Neal was relieved to see Dr. Khan smile at him when the tests were complete.

**You're doing very well. Neurologically, I'm not seeing any major deficits other than of course your hearing. You have some weakness on your left side but that should resolve with physical therapy. How do you feel?**

**Headache** , Neal wrote. **Tired.** His arms were too worn out by the testing to want to write any more detail.

The doctor nodded. **You still have a low-grade fever, and it's going to take some time for you to feel like yourself. Your lungs sound good, and your vital signs are much better. Try to be patient.**

Neal didn't see how he had much choice in the matter. After the doctor left, a breakfast tray arrived, and Neal picked at the vaguely sweet, tasteless glop he'd been served. He felt empty but not hungry, his stomach uncertain, but he swallowed as much of it as he could manage then pushed it away and napped until the next person came along to test him.

The hearing test was far less successful than the neurology tests had been. He felt like he was being asked to see in pitch blackness, the kind of darkness that gave the impression of vague shapes that might or might not truly be there. No matter how hard he tried, he heard nothing that he could be sure of, nothing other than sucking emptiness, and finally he knew it was pointless. He removed the audiologist's equipment from his head, closed his eyes, and laid down on his side, his arms crossed over his chest. His head ached fiercely, pounding from his eyes around to the back of his skull, and there was nothing else he could do.

When Neal woke later, there was a lunch tray sitting on the table by his bed, but he ignored it. Neal suddenly wondered if he had anything there at the hospital with him, but the drawer in the table was empty of personal belongings. Where was his phone? His wallet? Neal tried to remember what had happened, but all he could think of was getting home to June's after the series of flights back to New York from Cape Verde. He had a vague memory of feeling ill and being scared, but he could no more find a solid memory of what had happened than he could hear the tones of the audiologist's tests.

In the afternoon, a tall woman with shoulders almost as broad as Neal's arrived and explained that she would be getting him started with physical therapy--walking, to begin with. With the help of a nurse, Neal was disconnected from some of the equipment and tubes. Jen, the physical therapist, attached Neal to a harness, and as she slowly eased him to his feet he felt the room drop away from him to the left. He closed his eyes then quickly opened them when the sensation got worse. His stomach churned, and he groped for something to hold onto until he realized that Jen was holding him securely.

When the floor felt a little more stable, Neal took a few slow steps to get to the chair near his bed. Each step was difficult, with the room canting to the left and his left leg not working as well as his right. Nonetheless, he made it across the short distance and sank down to sit in the chair. 

**Good work,** Jen wrote on the whiteboard.

Neal's hand shook as he wrote his response. **Why is this so hard?**

Jen took the board back and nodded. **Dr. Khan told you about the weakness on your left side? That's making you clumsy in addition to some dizziness. We'll get you walking around the hallways in a few days.**

Neal raised his eyebrows.

Jen smiled and shook her head. **You'll see. You're in good shape, young. You'll be walking just fine.**

Neal hoped she was right. "Thanks," he said, disturbed again by the empty sound of it.

After a few minutes of rest, Jen helped him move back to the bed and guided him through some arm movements. Just before she left, she wrote another message. **Eat your lunch. You lost some muscle while you were sick, and you're going to need the energy. Ask your family to check on what you can eat and bring you better food. :)**

"Thanks, Jen." It was humiliating, but Neal was too tired to think about it very much. After the physical therapist left, Neal ate a yogurt from his lunch tray then gave in to his need for a nap. He hoped that when he woke up somebody would be there to visit him--somebody who wasn't there to do any tests.

\---

June walked into Neal's room and sighed in relief to see him looking much better than he had been even just two days earlier. She hadn't been able to get to the hospital the day before due to plans with her daughter and granddaughter, but Elizabeth Burke had kept her up to date. When they talked in the morning, June agreed to visit in the late afternoon after Neal's tests, and it wasn't a surprise to find him asleep after what must have been a tiring day. Still, Neal was hooked up to very few pieces of equipment, and he looked like he was resting comfortably. He certainly needed the rest.

She sat down to read in the chair next to his bed, but she hadn't been reading long when she heard Neal move around and hum quietly to himself as he woke up. She stood up and gave him a smile when he opened his eyes. "June," Neal said, his voice barely audible.

"Hello, dear," she said clearly enough for him to read her lips, and then she leaned down to lightly kiss his cheek. He felt no more than a tiny bit war, and that was such a relief compared to the way she had found Neal days earlier that she didn't know what to say. "Oh!" June reached into her purse and pulled out Neal's cell phone and charger.

He smiled when he saw them and mouthed _thank you_ then looked at his phone for a couple of minutes before setting it aside. Elizabeth had mentioned a whiteboard so June found it and began to write.

**I was with Samantha yesterday, and she made you a card. She also told me what I needed to get for you, and she helped me set it up. I'm afraid I don't know how to use it at all.** June handed the board to Neal along with Samantha's card, and he lingered over the hand-drawn card then read the board and looked up at June, shaking his head.

"Hush," June said, then pursed her lips, wishing she hadn't said that. Neal only looked confused so June pulled out the iPad, already in the bright blue cover Samantha had chosen, and set it on Neal's lap.

Neal looked at it, his eyes bright, then carefully opened the cover and tapped at the screen for a moment. When he turned it around there was a message on the screen. **Thank you, June. This is too much.**

"It is not." June returned to the whiteboard. **This will help you communicate and help entertain you while you're stuck in bed. And I can very well afford it.**

Neal didn't respond for a moment, but then he tapped on the screen again. **I appreciate it. Please thank Samantha for me.**

"I will."

Neal looked up from the tablet and rubbed at his forehead. June wrote on the board and held it up for him to see when he opened his eyes. **Rest. I'll be here until Peter comes to see you this evening. Do you want me to get a nurse?**

Neal shook his head no then closed his eyes and continued rubbing at his forehead until the pained lines on his face smoothed out and he seemed to fall asleep. June sat again and just watched him for a while, feeling a heavy weight of guilt and worry in her chest. She couldn't blame herself for Neal getting sick, but she also couldn't help thinking that if she had simply checked on him instead of leaving him be, he could have been treated so much earlier. He might not have lost his hearing, might well have already been home and feeling better.

June knew all too well that there was no way to change the past, but she was determined that she would do whatever was possible to help Neal in the future. Money couldn't fix everything, but when it came to problems that it could solve, June wasn't going to let anything stand in her way.

Neal slept for hours, never more than half-waking when somebody from the medical staff came to check on him. Byron had never been able to sleep well in the hospital, but she supposed that not being woken by extraneous noises had to be one of the few things benefiting Neal right then. When Peter arrived in the early evening, she took the opportunity while Neal was still sleeping to ask him a few questions.

"You know he won't be able to go back to working for you the moment he gets out of this hospital, don't you?"

Peter turned away from watching Neal and raised an eyebrow. "Of course not. God, June, I'm not even worried about that right now."

"Do you think you should be?"

Peter sighed and put his hands in his pockets. "Nobody at the Bureau other than me knows the details of his condition. My boss knows about the meningitis but not the ramifications, and the rest of our team just know that Neal is sick. I'm trying to maintain Neal's privacy as much as I can."

"And maybe trying to put off some problems as well?"

"The last few days, when I haven't been here I've been in meetings fighting for my own job."

June was taken aback. "I'm sorry, I didn't know."

"It's okay. It's resolved for now, and I'm in the doghouse but I think I'll be able to work my way out without too much long-term damage. I just couldn't go in and talk about Neal's future until I got past my own firing squad."

"He's going to need time to recover, a good bit of time I suspect, and he's going to need accommodations."

"Believe me, I know. I'll work it out."

"I believe you, but you need to know that if you or anybody else at the FBI push him to go back to work before his doctor releases him or if I hear tell of one word of discussion about Neal being sent back to prison or anywhere else I will hire lawyers who will make you wish you'd never arrested that boy in the first place."

Peter's eyes widened. "June--"

"I like you Peter, but I love Neal, and I let this happen to him, and I will not stand by if anybody tries to punish him for what wasn't his fault."

Peter was quiet for a moment, just watching Neal sleep. "It wasn't your fault either."

"I am not discussing that."

"Okay, well, I hear you, and I'm glad to know that you'll be on Neal's side on that. I'm on the same side, and if I think your lawyers are going to be necessary I'll let you know as soon as possible. I would quit before I was a part of sending Neal away for this."

"Well then I'm glad we're on the same side."

\---

Shortly after June left, a nurse came in to wake Neal and encourage him to eat the dinner that had been sitting on the table since before Peter arrived. Neal frowned as he sat up and looked at the meal.

Peter wrote on the whiteboard. **Do you want me to get you something else to eat?**

Neal squinted a little as he read it, then he picked up the blue-covered iPad that must have come from June and typed a message. **Thanks. Tomorrow, maybe? I'm really not hungry now.**

Neal sat with his eyes closed as Peter read the message, and as much as he had improved in the last few days he still looked terribly unwell, almost fragile. **Are you feeling worse?**

**No.** Neal looked at the screen for a moment then typed more. **Do I need to be worried about work?**

**No. It's taken care of.** At Neal's sceptical look, Peter continued. **I'm keeping the details close to my chest, but it's going to be okay. You DO NOT need to worry. I promise.**

Neal looked wary, but he nodded.

**On that subject, Diana and Jones and the rest of the team only know you're out sick. I can tell them you're not up for visitors, but I think they'll want to know that you're in the hospital. It's up to you if I tell them or not.**

Neal blinked, his eyes bright, and Peter gave him the space to deal with his feelings. Eventually, he typed his answer. **You can tell them. No on visitors though. Thanks.** Neal closed his eyes and rubbed at his forehead, and Peter thought he looked more washed-out than he had when he woke up.

**Sure you don't feel worse?**

**Just tired, long day, reading makes my head ache.**

Peter just squeezed Neal's shoulder in reply and let him sit with the food still untouched in front of him. After a few minutes, Neal opened his eyes and took the tablet back. **Go home. Please.**

"No." Peter shook his head, and Neal started typing again, his face looking tighter every minute.

**You look tired. And I'd like some time by myself.**

Peter didn't like the thought of leaving Neal alone, but at the same time Neal was an adult and seemed to know what he wanted.

"Please," Neal said, and hearing Neal's voice made it impossible to say no.

Peter reached for the iPad but then decided to spare Neal any more reading. He nodded and mouthed _okay_ then picked up Neal's phone from the table and mimed texting on it then pointed at himself. He thought the charades might get a smile from Neal, but he just nodded slightly and closed his eyes again. Peter stood watching him for a moment then squeezed his shoulder again and left.

At the nursing station, he stopped to talk to the nurse he'd seen checking on Neal earlier. "Neal asked me to leave for the night, but I need somebody to call me if anything happens. Anything." He handed her one of his business cards with his cell number written in, and she looked surprised then nodded.

"Sure, no problem."

"Oh, and he didn't eat anything. Can you tell me what he's allowed to have so I can bring in something appropriate?"

"Yeah, let me see." She did something on her computer then printed out a page and handed it over. Dietary requirements, great.

"Thank you. If the shift changes, you'll make sure somebody knows to call me?"

She looked like she wanted to roll her eyes but she just nodded. "I'll take care of it." All Peter could do was hope that she would--and hope even more that everything would be okay. 

At home, Peter found El watching TV in bed, and she looked worried as she stood up to greet him with a kiss. "You're home! Why are you home?"

Peter wrapped his arms around her and breathed in the scent of her shampoo then pulled away with a sigh. "Neal kicked me out." Peter stripped out of his suit then climbed into bed and fell asleep too quickly to even start worrying about what might come the next day.

Working at The Cave was a miserable punishment, but in a strange way it suited Peter. He would have been too distracted to do a good job on case work, but the monotony of cataloging evidence was just about his speed. He managed to meet up with Diana before he had to punch in and gave her the run-down on Neal's situation. She handled the news with her usual calm and promised to spread the word within their team.

"Look, Di. There's another part of this that I want to keep between us for now. Nobody knows this yet, not even Hughes, but he'll have to be told soon." Peter looked at the ground then back up at Diana. "Neal's lost his hearing, more or less completely. We're going to work around this. He'll be coming back to White Collar when he's feeling better."

"Of course." Diana looked horrified, but she just nodded. "I'll let you know if I hear anything. And you'll let me know when he's ready for a visitor?"

"I will. This means a lot, thank you."

"Always."

Peter watched as she drove off before heading into the evidence warehouse for his shift. Hours later, shortly before lunchtime, Peter was startled out of his cataloging by the ringing of his phone. Agent Patterson didn't approve of personal phone calls on Bureau time, but it looked like a hospital number. "Hello?"

"Mr. uh Agent Burke? This is Lidia from Bellevue."

Less than a minute later, Peter was on his way to clock out. "Family emergency!" he called out to Patterson, and he didn't look back. 

In the car, Peter took a deep breath and told himself that there wasn't any need to break any of the really important traffic laws in the process of getting to the hospital. Neal was being taken care of. Neal was where he needed to be. The nurse on the phone said that Neal had spiked a fever, that he had a severe headache and that he wasn't communicating well with the medical staff. By the time he finally arrived at the hospital, Peter could only hope that the absence of another phone call meant that the situation hadn't gotten any worse.

He was on his way down the hall when he heard something coming from a darkened room. "Pssst!" He felt a tug on his sleeve and turned, expecting to find somebody who had gotten lost on the way to the psychiatric ward, and found Mozzie.

"What the hell? Where did you come from?"

"I wouldn't know," Mozzie muttered. "June called me, and I've been trying to check on Neal without getting caught in the web of security cameras in this place. What's going on down there?"

"I was on my way to find out. Look, I'll come find you later on but it might be a while."

" _I'll_ find _you_."

"Fine. Whatever." Peter left Mozzie to the shadows and hurried the rest of the way down the hall to Neal's room. 

Neal was curled up on his side with a plastic basin nearby, and Peter felt sick himself at the sight of an oxygen cannula attached to Neal again. His eyes were barely open, and he was breathing unevenly, making small, pained sounds on the exhales. Peter was about to reach out and try to get his attention when a doctor Peter didn't recognize walked in the room. "What's going on?"

"You're--" she checked her chart, "--Peter Burke?" At Peter's nod she continued, "I'm Dr. Lansing. We ran Neal's bloodwork, and he has a UTI, likely from having had a catheter for a few days. We've added another antibiotic, and we're working on bringing his fever down but he's feeling pretty awful right now."

"Is this--is it bad?"

"It's likely to add at least a few days onto his stay here, but I don't expect the UTI to cause any permanent issues. The new antibiotic should knock it out, but combined with everything else it's causing him to be nauseated."

"The nurse said he had a severe headache?"

"Yes. You know that Neal's been experiencing headaches as a result of the meningitis?"

"I didn't know they were that bad."

"The fever exacerbated the headache. We did give him some pain medication in the IV, but I want to keep the dose low considering the other drugs in his system and what he's been through in the last week. If you can help him stay calm that would be the best thing for him right now."

"Okay."

"Also, I know that the phone and the tablet are incredibly useful for communication given Neal's hearing loss, but he's still experiencing photophobia--sensitivity to light--and the screens can be hard on the eyes. Communication is vital, I understand that, but for the next few days he should avoid them as much as possible."

Peter hated the thought of Neal being cut off further, but he nodded. "Okay."

"I doubt he'll even want to look at them for the rest of today, possibly not even the whiteboard."

"Is there anything I can do to help him feel better? I don't--" Peter looked over at Neal, who looked beyond miserable. "I don't know what to do."

"I'll get somebody to bring in a cloth and some cool water. It's old-fashioned, but it can help with discomfort from the fever."

"Thanks."

The doctor walked out, and Peter dragged a chair around to the side of the bed Neal was facing and sat down. Neal's eyes were part way open, his forehead creased with pain from the headache, and he slowly moved his head to make eye contact with Peter. 

"Hi," Peter said with a small wave. One corner of Neal's mouth quirked up on a tiny hint of a smile, but otherwise his face was still and tense and grayish pale under his beard. Neal's arms were bent in front of him, awkwardly turned to accommodate the IVs, and Peter put his hand on Neal's wrist. He felt the too-warm skin under his palm and watched as Neal's eyes slid closed. Peter didn't mean to do it but he found himself moving his thumb back and forth in an arc over Neal's forearm. Neal didn't seem to mind so Peter kept up the movement, almost hypnotizing himself until an aide came in the room to put some cloths and a basic of water on the table next to Peter.

"Thank you," Peter whispered, the belatedly remembered there was no need to whisper. He stood, and the moment he lifted his hand from Neal's arm he heard Neal's breath stutter.

"Don't go," Neal said, and Peter put his hand on Neal's face until he opened his eyes. 

"I will be here," Peter said slowly, then repeated it when he wasn't sure Neal had caught the words. Neal nodded and swallowed thickly as he closed his eyes again, and he squirmed under the covers until he was situated on his back. Neal's skin felt so hot--not the terrifying fever of days ago, but too warm for comfort, and Peter hoped he wasn't doing it wrong as he dipped the cloth in the water, wrung it out most of the way, and laid it out on Neal's forehead.

Neal tensed at the change and opened his eyes briefly before closing them again. Some strands of Neal's hair were caught under the cloth, and Peter teased them out gently then smoothed Neal's hair back from his forehead. Neal visibly relaxed under the touch, so Peter tried it again. Neal's hair was sweaty and clearly suffering from the lack of his usual grooming, but Peter didn't mind as he slowly pushed his fingers into the dense length of the bangs and smoothed them back toward the pillow. Neal sighed, and it sounded like relief rather than irritation, so Peter continued.

It felt intimate, and Peter wasn't sure if it was wrong of him to think that, but he couldn't help it, and he couldn't stop when what he was doing seemed to help Neal. After a few minutes, he re-dampened the cloth and wiped it over Neal's face and neck before folding it back on his forehead. After a brief hesitation, Peter went back to combing his fingers through Neal's hair. He watched Neal's face carefully to make sure he wasn't causing any pain, and the lines of pain on his face had smoothed out, leaving him looking haggard but calm.

Peter still had his hand in Neal's hair when Neal opened his lips and formed two words. They were barely whispered, not much more than mouthed over a puff of air, but they were clear: "Love you."

Peter froze and held his breath waiting to see if anything else would follow but Neal seemed to be asleep now. It could have meant anything; Neal was fevered and medicated, and he could have been imagining his mother or Sara or Kate or the tooth fairy. And yet Peter thought that Neal had been conscious of Peter's presence, had been holding onto it. It might have meant nothing, but Peter felt a spark of hope burning in his chest. 

When he was sure that Neal was fully asleep, Peter left the room and walked down the hall until Mozzie waylaid him again. "What took so long? What's going on?"

"Neal needed me, that's what took so long." Peter rubbed a hand over his face and noticed that Mozzie looked exhausted and anxious as hell. "He has an infection, but they think it should clear up in a few days. The fever gave him a bad headache, but it's better now."

Mozzie nodded and crossed his arms over his chest. "I heard him shouting."

" _Neal_ shouting?"

"He wouldn't have known how loud he was being."

"Right. Well, I don't know how you've been communicating with him, but he's supposed to stay away from the electronic devices for the next couple of days."

"I can deal with that."

"Look, I know you like being sneaky but I can add you to his approved visitors list so you don't have to creep around in here."

"There's no need."

Peter shrugged. "Well, if you get caught by security have them give me a call."

"Thanks, Suit." He looked twitchy for a moment before he added, "If I had come back with you and Neal, he wouldn't have been alone."

"We can all play that game. You think I don't wish I'd taken him to my house? He had a headache, but I thought it was just the flights, the long few days. We can fight over the blame, but I don't see how that's going to help Neal."

Mozzie nodded but didn't reply.

"Okay, I'm going back to sit with him. If you want to say hello to my wife, I think she'll be here with Neal tomorrow." Peter didn't wait for a reply. He swung by the snack machine to get himself a bag of nuts and a soda then went back to find Neal much as he'd left him. After he refreshed the cloth again, Peter sat down with his hand on Neal's arm and sent a few texts of his own, working out a schedule to keep Neal company. June would come for a while in the evening, and then Peter would come back to stay the night. El had the next day free, and she would stay with Neal while Peter put in his time in The Cave.

Neal being alone, sick and scared wasn't acceptable, and Peter wasn't going to let it happen again.

\---

El set her alarm for early in the morning before the sun came up, and when she walked into Neal's hospital room she found the room filled with shadows and Peter stretched out asleep on a recliner. The chair was too short for his legs and too narrow for his shoulders, but it was better than nothing. She thought that Neal was asleep as well but when she got close to the bed she saw that his eyes were open and he was looking at Peter with a naked kind of affection she had glimpsed a few times before.

El hesitated, not sure how she could let Neal know she was there without scaring him, then gave up and walked into his line of sight. Neal shuttered his expression as soon as he saw her, and she waved her hand in greeting. She would have liked to let Peter sleep, but he needed to get cleaned up and get to work. He had come home and showered the previous evening then packed a bag with his toiletries and electric razor; the plan was for him to clean up and change in the hospital bathroom to avoid another trip to Brooklyn.

They didn't have a lot of time to waste, so El shook Peter's shoulder to wake him. "Good morning, honey."

Peter opened his eyes and gave her a sleepy smile before standing up and groaning as he rolled his shoulders. "Morning." She let him pass with just a peck on the cheek, then sat down in the warm seat he'd left behind. Neal's eyes were closed, but El didn't think he was asleep so she reached out and lightly touched the backs of her fingers to his forehead and then his cheek--warm, but not very hot. It made her heart hurt to think of how little they could do for Neal right now, and it hurt even more when he opened his eyes and gave her a bleary half-smile.

The room was too dim for Neal to be able to lip-read at all so she went to turn on a light then came back to find Neal squinting against the brightness. "I'm sorry!" She turned to go turn the light off, but Neal put his hand on her wrist.

"I'm okay," Neal mumbled, and El hesitantly sat down again.

The whiteboard was propped next to the bed, and El knew that Neal couldn't focus enough to read for long but she hoped a few words would be okay. **I'M STAYING HERE TODAY,** she wrote in larger letters than normal. Neal shook his head, looking concerned, but El gave him a stern look and underlined the words she'd written. **I WANT TO BE HERE.**

Peter came out of the bathroom with a clean shave and gave her a much better morning kiss then said goodbye to Neal before leaving for work. Neal rested with his eyes closed and El checked her email on her laptop until a nurse came in to chase her out while they cleaned up Neal and took care of other things that were too personal for El's presence. When the doctors came around soon after, El asked to stay, and Neal nodded his agreement. There wasn't anything new, not really, but being there with Neal felt like the right thing to do.

Neal refused any breakfast other than the cup of grape juice on his tray then fell back to sleep until his physical therapist arrived. She was tall, with dark blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail, and she introduced herself as she reached out to shake El's hand. 

"Are you family?" she asked.

"I--yes, we're family." It was the truth, after all, and a more detailed explanation would be too much.

Jen nodded then tapped Neal on the shoulder and smiled at him when he opened his eyes.

"He's really not feeling well." El crossed her arms over her chest, and she felt a ridiculous urge to throw herself over Neal to protect him. The last thing she wanted to do was allow him to be tormented when all he wanted to do was rest.

"I know, and we're not going to try to run a mile today. Getting out of bed for just a few minutes can help prevent some complications you really don't want to deal with, and it'll help Neal get home sooner. We're just going to see what we can do."

"O-okay." El stepped back, but she wasn't about to leave the room.

Jen wrote on a whiteboard, and El was about to argue when she saw that just a few words were written on it. **Up and at 'em.**

Neal quirked a small smile in Jen's direction then let her guide him into sitting up straight. Neal braced his hands on the bed and dropped his chin to his chest, clearly fighting dizziness, and El ached to reach out to him but she was afraid to make things worse. Jen got the IV pole situated correctly, and when Neal looked less like he was about to lose it she attached a harness to his waist and helped him stand up. Neal swayed in place, and El took a couple of quick steps closer but Jen held her off with a look.

El watched as Jen made Neal take a few uneven, halting steps and then as Neal sat and did a few simple exercises at Jen's prompting. When Neal stood up to move back to the bed he faltered but Jen held him up; awe of the woman's upper body strength distracted El from her worry for just a moment. By the time Neal was seated on the bed again, he was breathing heavily, and he managed to pick up the bowl from his bedside table just in time to throw up the almost-nothing that was in his stomach.

El was done hanging back; she rubbed gently between his too-prominent shoulder blades until he relaxed enough to breathe evenly again. Jen put a hand on Neal's arm to get his attention, and when he looked at her she said, "I'm sorry." She did look genuinely sorry, and El didn't envy the woman her job but she did want Jen to leave them alone.

"Thank you," El said, and when the physical therapist was gone she helped Neal lie down flat. 

He put one hand over his face and rolled to his side, and El reached for the bowl until she realized that he wasn't about to be sick. He was crying, and El froze. This wasn't a few squeezed out tears, this was _weeping_. In between shuddering breaths, Neal murmured, "sorry," once then twice, and El 's eyes burned with sympathetic tears. El put her hand on Neal's head then smoothed her palm over his hair to his shoulder and arm, but Neal's tears weren't stopping, and the distant touch wasn't enough.

Neal's body was bent in a half-circle, and El pushed down the bed rail then boosted herself up to sit on the unoccupied piece of mattress. She put her arm around Neal's back, pulling him closer, and as he shifted to find a comfortable position he ended up halfway in El's lap, his too-warm head on her shoulder. It was awkward, with two bodies and the IV lines sharing a small space, but Neal's tears tapered off as he fell into an exhausted sleep.

El knew that she shouldn't be surprised given that the reading she'd done had indicated that Neal might experience mood swings and difficulty controlling his emotions as he recovered but the gulf between those words and the reality of a strong man losing control in her arms. Still, holding Neal close was good. She wished she could keep holding him close until everything was better.

Neal didn't sleep long. El felt him wake with a start, then he sat up and slowly situated himself next to her, leaning against the back of the bed. He looked embarrassed as he said, "sorry," and El just shook her head. She reached for the whiteboard then sat with the marker in her hand, unsure what to write. There was so much that needed to be said and so few ways to communicate. She knew that would change, that Neal would be able to handle the tablet and phone again soon and that they would all make learning sign language a priority, but for the present she felt like she was back in her college poetry class, trying to say something worthwhile in a haiku.

**You're family, mine and Peter's. No apologies.**

Neal looked at the board for longer than it could have possibly taken him to read it, then he looked over at El, his face full of emotions that she couldn't quite parse. He sighed then asked, "Why?"

El drew a circle around the first two words of her note and then an arrow pointing at the circle. She thought that maybe Neal didn't have the experience to know what family could be, but she had a feeling he would learn.

Lunchtime came, and El went out to call Peter and to see if she could find something Neal would be willing to eat. She heard a whispering voice say her name and turned to see Mozzie gesturing to her from the partially open door of a supply room. El put her hands on her hips. "Mozzie! Get out of there and come with me."

"I'm trying to avoid the surveillance," he whispered harshly.

"Oh, just stop it." El tugged Mozzie out into the hallway then threaded her arm through his and led him back to Neal's room. "He needs to not be alone, and I need to go find some food. Will you be here when I get back."

Mozzie looked around and huffed then gave in. "Yes, Mrs. Suit."

"Thank you!"

El had an idea that she thought might tempt Neal, so she headed out of the hospital to find it. It was good to get some fresh air and stretch her legs, and she bought and ate a salad before picking up Neal's lunch and heading back to the hospital. In Neal's room, she found Mozzie perched on the edge of the chair next to Neal's bed, the two of them communicating in what certainly looked like signs.

"Wait, you two know sign language already?"

"We may have acquired a limited vocabulary in French sign language for a--a job many years ago."

"Oh. Can you teach me? And Peter?"

"Don't you think it would be better for all of us to learn ASL or Signed English? It would be more useful, and pursuing FSL now would only be confusing."

El didn't know what the difference was; she was definitely going to have to do some research. "Okay. Well, do you know the signs for 'blueberry milkshake?'"

"Not particularly." Mozzie picked up the whiteboard and wrote **blueberry milkshake?** with an arrow that would point toward El when he held it up for Neal.

Neal raised his eyebrows and looked uncertain, but he held his hand out to accept the plastic cup from El. He took a sip then looked around, and El got the impression that it was making him nervous to be watched. "Come on, Mozzie. Do you play pinochle?"

"Do rats like cheese? Of course I play."

El pulled a pack of cards out of her purse and brought the other chair in the room around so that they could use the windowsill as their table. By the time they were finished with their game, Neal was asleep with the mostly empty cup sitting next to him on the table.

\---

Neal stood leaning on the sink in the bathroom of his hospital room and tried to remind himself of the positives of his situation. He was walking, even if he felt unsteady and tired already after a few minutes out of bed, and he’d taken a piss by himself, standing on his own two feet. He could see, though what he could see at the moment was himself in the mirror looking like death warmed over, and he could look at the iPad and his phone for more than a few minutes at a time without feeling like his brain was in revolt. He could think, mostly, and the neurologist predicted that the haze clouding his thoughts and wrecking his concentration should pass as he continued to recover.

Neal felt his legs tremble, so he turned slowly and made his way back to bed. There were other positives—he didn’t want to think about what the last several days would have been like without his friends. The first few days of his hospital stay were a complete blank, and the next few were little more than moments of waking to confusion and pain and then the comfort of Peter or Elizabeth or June or even Mozzie being there next to him. In the week since he’d been knocked back down a notch by the UTI, life had gone from a grinding misery of pain and seeming isolation to a detached kind of boredom that was far less awful and yet more isolating in its way.

Neal was about to be discharged, after all, and he wasn’t nearly sick enough to allow himself to give in to the comforts that had held him together before. He couldn’t put the events of a week previous in any kind of coherent order, but he could remember Peter’s hand in his hair, strong fingers massaging out the worst of the pain that had burned through his head. He could remember the shocking kindness of Elizabeth holding him when controlling his emotions had been impossible. Peter and Elizabeth had offered him their guest room—Peter had nearly insisted on it—but Neal didn’t think he could take sleeping there when he could neither ask for nor accept the comfort he remembered all too well.

And June, June had made it clear that she was arranging for all of the gadgets and all of the therapy and training that would help Neal hold onto as much of his old life as possible. He hated that some of her motivation for helping was guilt, but he wasn’t in any position to decline her offer and he didn’t have the energy it would have taken to fight her. Mozzie had been relatively scarce, but spending time in the hospital brought out the worst of his paranoia and Neal was both grateful and slightly shocked that Mozzie had given up their island paradise and, according to June, taken up installing the equipment that would help Neal live independently at home. Then again, Neal suspected that between Mozzie and the rest of his friends “independent” was going to be a relative thing.

The table next to Neal’s bed was decorated with a few cards, including one from the White Collar team, and a balloon arrangement from the team was just starting to lose its bouyancy. They gave him something to look at other than the beige ceiling when he lay on his back trying to hold on to all of those positives in the face of the crushing reality that he’d never hear music again, never hear a human voice or the sounds of making love or the wind in the trees or flowing water. The audiologist had said that Neal would be able to get some small benefit from using hearing aids and that a cochlear implant might be a possibility once Neal was fully recovered from the meningitis, but Neal had read enough to know that neither of those options would allow him to hear the way he had before. It wouldn’t even be close, and Neal wasn’t sure if the negatives of the assistive devices would outweigh the benefits.

As it was, he wouldn’t be able to hear somebody shouting from two feet away or a car about to run him down or somebody breaking in to his bedroom, and the thought of that was utterly chilling. Neal had always made a point of keeping himself sharp and aware, and that had served him well in all aspects of his life. Peter had promised that Neal’s deal with the FBI wouldn’t be revoked, and Neal clung to that promise because the idea of going back to prison as a deaf man—a deaf _snitch_ —was likely to mean living in a silent box until somebody walked up behind him and slit his throat.

The greatest temptation was to let himself believe that when he left the hospital everything would be okay, that the nightmare of silence would magically end as the doors swooshed shut behind him, and the sounds of the city would envelop him. Neal had spent a few days indulging himself in that self-deceit, and it had allowed him to drift through the days, playing along with what the physical therapist and the and the doctors and everybody else wanted him to do without actually caring how well he did or worrying when it was all too difficult.

The one thing he didn’t want to play along with was speaking. Once he was well enough to have conversations via typing and writing, Neal was also well enough to realize that he had no idea what his voice sounded like when he used it. The idea of talking too loudly or incoherently was just too much. He didn’t have any choice about looking ill and unkempt, but he could chose not to make a spectacle of himself vocally. It was an easy choice to make, and not using his voice provided a layer of protection between the emotions he couldn’t always control and the rest of the world.

Peter had been trying to goad him into speaking, but even in his current state Neal could resist Peter’s attempts at manipulation. Elizabeth and June didn’t push him, and when Mozzie visited they made due with their old pidgin of French sign language. Neal’s phone vibrated on the bed next to him, and he picked it up to see a text from Peter. **On my way up with dinner.** Neal rolled his eyes while Peter wasn’t there to see him. It chafed that everybody was obsessed with feeding him, but given that his friends were saving him from hospital food he couldn’t begrudge them their efforts. Elizabeth had kept him supplied with milkshakes when they were the only thing that didn’t make him sick, and for that he was sincerely grateful.

Now that he was eating normal food, more or less, he was mainly grateful that Peter wasn’t bringing him devilled ham or leaving him to the mercies of the hospital dieticians. A few minutes after the text, the room lights blinked on and off and Neal looked over to see Peter entering the room. One of the nurses had suggested that Neal’s guests blink the lights to serve as a manual substitute for the flashing light “doorbell” Neal would have at home, and once he was awake enough to care it was helpful to avoid being startled every time somebody came into the room.

Peter unpacked soup and bread, and Neal inhaled the fresh smell of it, a welcome change from the stale hospital air. They both ate, and when Peter was finished with his sandwich he typed a message on the iPad. **How was your day?**

Neal took another swallow of his soup before answering. **I walked to the bathroom by myself without falling over.**

Peter looked genuinely pleased by that, even if it sounded awfully trivial to Neal. **Good job,** he typed.

**Thanks.**

At that, Peter frowned and his shoulders rose and fell as he took a deep breath in and out. **You could have said that out loud.**

Neal shrugged, and that only frustrated Peter further.

**WHY won’t you speak? Does it hurt?**

Neal resisted the sudden urge to fling the iPad across the room. As much as it would have been satisfying for a minute or two, he knew he would only feel horrible afterward, for wasting the gift from June and the thoughtfulness of her granddaughter, not to mention the fact that it would make communication more difficult. **I don’t have any way of knowing if I sound right. I don’t want to sound like an idiot.**

Peter pursed his lips as he read that. **Saying THAT makes you sound like an idiot, Using your voice doesn't.**

**I don’t want to be too loud or too quiet or anything like that.** _Let me hold on to some scrap of my dignity,_ Neal thought.

**What if I promise to tell you? We can figure out some signs. Would that make a difference?**

Neal didn’t respond immediately. The truth was that it would make a difference, and he trusted Peter to give him the right signals without condescending, but it still seemed like more trouble than it was worth. **Why do you care so much about this?**

Peter read that then looked away for a few breaths. **Because I don’t want you to lose your voice. If you stop using it now, you might never be able to get it back. I don’t want to never hear your voice again.** There was something vulnerable in Peter’s eyes when he looked up after typing that, and Neal felt the ache of it in his chest.

“O-okay,” he said, his throat feeling rough as if he hadn’t spoken in months. “I’ll try.”

Peter rewarded him with a wide smile and then a hug that filled Neal’s nose with the scent of his cologne and surrounded him with the warmth of Peter’s arms. He could vaguely remember being held when it felt like the whole world was falling apart around him, but this was better. Much better. Neal’s eyes teared up despite him, and he was tempted to bury his head on Peter’s shoulder, to press his lips to the skin just above Peter’s shirt collar, but that would be horribly wrong. Controlling his emotions was difficult, but he could control his actions, and he wouldn’t ever ruin his friendships with Peter and Elizabeth that way. He had no right.

Neal pulled back from the hug and Peter stepped away, then reached for the iPad. He looked unsettled, but just typed, **Let’s figure out the plan for breaking you out of here tomorrow.**

“Yes, please” Neal said, and when Peter held up one hand and pressed down slightly on the air he repeated the words again with less force. “Yes, please." Peter gave him a thumbs-up, and Neal thought, _I can do this._ He didn’t see how he had much of a choice.

~~~

The stairs up to Neal's apartment at June's were far steeper and more numerous than Neal remembered, and the effort of making his way up all of those steps with his imperfect balance and lazy left leg was almost enough to make him reconsider June's offer of a downstairs bedroom. Almost. The rooms upstairs had been home for Neal for longer than anywhere in his adult life, and the first step of trying to reclaim "normal" was getting home to those rooms and that terrace and their view. Peter was ever-present, his bulk at Neal's side and his hand on Neal's back, and Neal hated that he loved that reassurance, but he loved it anyway.

Letting himself into the apartment was an echo of arriving home from Cape Verde nearly two weeks previous. He'd been tired then too, with a headache he thought would be cured with a bottle of water and several hours of sleep. He couldn't remember much beyond putting himself to bed, just a distant impression of sickness and fear, and he didn't want to linger on that as he looked around his bright, beautiful, familiar apartment. 

Mozzie greeted him with a wordless offer of wine, which he probably knew Neal would decline, then took Neal on a tour of the improvements he'd made. His front door now had a doorbell, and pressing it caused lights in the apartment to blink. Opening the door without using the doorbell caused a different pattern of flashing light, and opening the doors from the terrace did the same. There was a new flashing smoke alarm, and an alarm clock that would rattle his bed. The alarm clock would also charge his phone, with an option to rattle the bed if a call or text came through.

Neal followed Mozzie around the apartment and saw that the door alarms made the lights blink everywhere, from the living area to the bathroom and the walk-in closet. Wiring all of that, in an old house no less, was a big job, and Neal had to bite his lip to try to push back the swell of emotion. Neal didn't trust his voice right then, he couldn't, but he didn't want to use their old signs either. [Thank you,] Neal mouthed at Mozzie, and considering how embarrassed Mozzie looked he clearly understood the depth of Neal's gratitude. 

Peter walked over and started talking to Mozzie, and Neal wandered over to the sofa to sit down, suddenly exhausted. He wasn't quite asleep, just drifting, when he jerked awake to a touch on his forehead. "What?" He frowned up at Peter who was looming over him.

Peter held up his hands apologetically then sat down and pulled out his phone. **Just wanted to make sure you didn't have a fever. Sorry.**

Neal sighed. He understood that all of his friends had been traumatized in one way or another by his illness, but the level of attention was difficult to accept. He sincerely hoped that it would get better now that he was home. "Just tired," Neal said, then pulled out his own phone. **Why don't you head out and take Mozzie with you?**

Peter raised his eyebrows. **I think Mozzie is planning to occupy your couch for the near future.**

Neal shrugged, not surprised. **I can deal with that, but it's not even noon. I need some space.**

**Will you answer if I call?**

Neal wanted to fume, but he suspected he wasn't going to get a much better offer. **I promise.**

As soon as he was alone, Neal dragged himself to the shower, where he discovered grab bars had been installed. He hated their presence, and he hated that they made him feel safer, and he promised himself he would thank Mozzie--and that he would get them removed as soon as he was steadier on his feet. Clean of the hospital miasma and smelling of his own soap and shampoo, Neal plugged his phone in to the alarm clock then crawled in between his soft, silky sheets, stretched out on his queen size bed and fell asleep.

~~~

Neal felt like he was at the center of a cottage industry. There was the physical therapist, not Jen from the hospital but rather Sylvia, who worked in a small practice about four blocks from June's house. There was enough exercise equipment to stock a gym, and she seemed to enjoy torturing Neal with repetitive exercises that left him wrung out to the point that he needed a ride home for those four blocks. There was a speech therapist, which seemed vaguely ridiculous, but June and Peter both insisted that it was worthwhile, and Neal didn't have the will to fight them. 

He did fight them on the idea of a psychologist, and he won, probably because they knew there was little point in making the appointments if Neal wasn't willing to participate. There was nothing a psychologist could do about the fact that Neal's life was irrevocably different, that his body was weak and his brain was literally damaged. Sitting around writing notes back and forth with somebody who didn't know him wasn't even slightly appealing. Neal had talked to a psychologist in prison, and he'd talked circles around the man without even breaking a sweat. It was pointless.

And then there was Jackson. Jackson showed up mid-morning on the third day after Neal got home from the hospital, his arrival announced by the blinking lights Mozzie had installed. Mozzie had slept over every night since Neal got home, and he usually loafed around the apartment in the morning. He had hared off early that particular morning, but Neal hadn't found that suspicious until he opened his door to find a stranger smiling at him. June or the housekeeper must have let him in, so Neal suspected Mozzie wasn't the only person in on this plan.

"Hello," Neal said. He pulled his phone out of his pocket, ready to either type a message to the stranger or text Peter with 911, but replied in sign. They weren't from among the small collection of French signs he'd learned with Mozzie, but Neal had picked up a few other words of sign along the way. "Good morning?" he asked, echoing the sign.

The stranger, an Asian man who looked like he was about forty years old, nodded his hand and repeated part of the earlier sign. " _Yes. Good._ " He held out his phone, and Neal took it to read the message on the screen. **My name is Jackson Park, and Mrs. Ellington has hired me to be your deaf coach. I have training as an occupational therapist, and I've been deaf since I was ten years old. What do you think?**

Neal handed the phone back with a sigh and gestured for the man to come inside. Neal sat down at the dining table, and Jackson sat down across the table as Neal pulled his iPad over and started typing. **I think June is very kind, but I think I have enough therapists right now.**

**Do you know how to go out in the world and be safe and confident?**

**I think I can figure it out. I'm still getting over being sick.**

**Sure, okay. And you think that typing is a good communication strategy for the rest of your life? For talking with your friends and family?**

**It works. I'll learn sign when I'm ready to go to a class.**

**You don't think there might be something useful that you could learn from me?**

**Look, I appreciate that you took the time to come here, but I'm not a child. When I'm feeling better, I'll figure it out.**

Jackson shrugged. **Okay, man. Fair enough. If you change your mind, text or email me.** He passed over a card, and Neal let it rest under his fingers. Jackson walked out the door, and Neal thought about how he couldn't hear the door close, couldn't hear the man's footsteps recede on the staircase. After a moment he gave in to his curiosity and went to check to make sure the man wasn't hanging around outside his door but nobody was there.

Neither June nor Mozzie said anything about Neal's rejection of their "deaf coach," and Neal was glad that he didn't have to defend his decision. He went back to bed and read a novel until his head started to hurt. He took a pill then buried his head in the pillows. He needed rest; rest was good.

\---

Peter stood outside Neal's door and contemplated the key in his hand versus the button for the doorbell. Peter had texted a few times during the day, but Neal hadn't answered, and as much as Peter tried to tell himself that Neal deserved some peace and privacy Peter couldn't help worrying. He couldn't help thinking about the hours he'd spent trying to call Neal on that Sunday morning while Neal had been passed out on the floor, burning up and barely alive. He wasn't sure if he'd ever be able to stop thinking about that.

Still, Peter knew it wasn't right to just barge in without at least giving Neal a chance to let him in. With the key held tight in his fist, Peter run the doorbell and waited. There was a bell, more to let visitors know it was working than anything else, but Peter hoped that Neal would see the blinking lights and answer the door. After pressing the button two more times with no response, Peter gave in and unlocked the door. As he opened the door, he saw the different pattern of lights flashing but no Neal.

A thud came from the bedroom area, and Peter hurried over there to see Neal standing by the bed, wild-eyed. They looked at each other for a moment, then Neal closed his eyes and sighed with a hand on his chest. "Scared me," Neal said.

Peter put a hand on Neal's shoulder, and when Neal opened his eyes he made one of the signs he'd learned in the last few days. [Sorry.]

"[O-K,] Neal signed back then reached for his iPad. **Mozzie hooked up the door-open alarm to the alarm that shakes the bed.**

**You were asleep? Are you feeling okay?**

**Small headache, not bad.**

Peter reached out to feel Neal's forehead for a fever, and to his surprise Neal didn't try to avoid the touch. His face felt neither cold nor hot, so Peter thought he didn't have a fever, but the way Neal leaned into the touch for a few seconds made Peter ache do more. Now that Neal was more himself, at home, recovering, Peter didn't know what was allowed. The hospital had been a place apart, but now they were back in reality. Then again, Peter thought, reality wasn't ever going to be exactly the same. Peter moved his hand from Neal's forehead to his cheek and looked him in the eye as he signed, " _O-K?_ " back at him.

Neal looked for a moment like he was going to say something more but he finally just shrugged. "Tired."

**You want to talk about anything?**

Neal shook his head.

**Mind if I hang around a while?**

Neal shook his head again, and Peter took that as a request for company. He heated up dinner for both of them, and when the food was gone they cleared the table for a game of Parcheesi. When focusing on the tablet or a TV with close captions would only make Neal feel worse, playing the old-fashioned board game took away the awkwardness of sitting around not talking. Facial expressions and small gestures said it all, and for a little while it could be almost like nothing had changed.

Almost.

\---

Neal woke up from his alarm clock vibrating his bed, and he felt...good. For once, he wasn't disoriented from the stuffy silence, and his head didn't hurt, and he had energy that made him want to get out and do something. He gave Mozzie a smile on his way to the bathroom to clean up, and Moz looked at him like he'd grown a second head overnight. Neal looked at himself in the bathroom mirror, and he still looked too thin but he didn't exactly look sick. He was too pale, and he needed a haircut, and those were two things that could be solved by going out in the world.

Since coming home from the hospital, Neal had only been out of June's house for appointments, and he'd been driven to all of them. Neal loved walking, and there was nothing wrong with his legs aside from some muscle loss and a little bit of unsteadiness on occasion; it was time to get moving. Neal showered and shaved, and when he sat down at the table in one of his favorite suits Mozzie looked at him as if a third head had sprouted.

**Playing dress-up?** Mozzie scrawled on a notepad.

**I'm going to take a walk, get my hair cut.**

**Okay. Where are we going?**

"Alone, Moz," Neal said. Mozzie looked at his steadily, doubtfully, but didn't respond. **I need to be able to do this.**

Mozzie shook his head then shrugged. [O-K.]

Neal ate his breakfast then made sure he had his phone in his pocket before heading out. He wanted to jog down the stairs, but he knew he wasn't there yet. His balance had improved a lot in just a week, but it was still nowhere near Neal's normal sure-footedness, and the last thing he wanted to do was start his day off with a tumble down the stairs.

Outside, Neal took a deep breath of not-so-fresh city air and felt awake, alive. He startled when somebody bumped into him then realized he was interrupting the flow of foot traffic with his own private moment. He made his way to a less-busy side street and concentrated on paying attention to everything he could see. The city in silence was alien, as if the cars and trucks had a new way of moving that didn't involve engines and tires over bumpy pavement and beeping horns, as if nobody on the street around him were speaking, all of them walking as quietly as cat-burglars. Neal could feel vibrations under his feet, the subway, he thought, but the whole thing was unnerving.

Somebody could be walking behind him, he thought, somebody could be about to run him over. He spun on his heel but there was nobody other than a middle aged woman walking a dog. She glanced his way but didn't make eye contact, and Neal took a slow, deep breath to calm himself down. He thought about going to the salon he normally preferred for haircuts; they could usually fit him in without an appointment, and he wasn't in any hurry. However, he didn't like the idea of having to explain to them why he was suddenly unable to hear, so he went to a random salon with a "walk-ins welcome" sign.

The girl behind the counter raised an eyebrow when he held out his phone but she nodded and smiled at him after she read the message he'd typed on the screen. He got seated in a chair and managed to communicate what kind of trim he wanted, and it was awkward but okay. When it was done, his hair neat instead of wild, he looked more like himself, and it was worth the generous tip he gave the stylist.

Neal was starting to feel a bit of fatigue, but the day was mild and sunny, and he had a fresh haircut. It seemed like a waste to go straight back home so he decided to walk to one of his favorite markets. He would buy some fresh ingredients then go home and make a nice dinner after relaxing for a while. He could still do things; it was okay.

In the market, Neal grabbed a basket and went to choose some produce then made his way to the deli counter. The man working behind the counter wasn't Neal's favorite; he was surly and brusque at the best of times, but it had never been any more than a slight irritation to Neal before. He thought about just going for the pre-packaged meat, but he really wanted some freshly sliced prosciutto, and he wasn't going to let an unfriendly grocery store employee get in his way. The idea of talking out-loud when he had no idea how his voice sounded and no Peter to check himself by was uncomfortable, so he typed up his order as a note on his phone and held it up to the deli man. The man shook his head and frowned, waving away Neal's phone. He was speaking rapidly, and Neal remembered that the man had a heavy accent. He had a moustache as well, and Neal couldn't read his lips at all.

Neal held his phone up again, and made himself say, "Please," but the man just continued talking and turned as if to go back to what he was doing before Neal approached the counter. "Prosciutto!" Neal said, and from the man's reaction he gathered that his voice had been too loud. Neal's heart was racing and when he realized there was so much more to communicate--what brand he wanted, how much, how thinly sliced--he gave up. It wasn't worth the trouble, so he walked away, picked up a package of pre-sliced prosciutto and moved on. 

The store had begun to get busy while Neal shopped, and the narrow aisles were crowded with people. Neal tried to stay aware of what was going on around him, but he was worn out, ready to be home already. He was trying to find the last two ingredients he needed when he stepped backward and ran into somebody. In his haste to get away, he tripped on the wheel of a baby carriage. He tried to regain his footing, but his balance was gone, everything tilting around him. He tumbled against a shelf, pulling boxes of pasta down with him as he hit the floor. The crowd of people looking down at him looked huge, distorted, and from the way Neal's throat ached he could only hope he wasn't making any noise.

Suddenly there was a middle-aged man in his space, and Neal pulled back against the shelf he was leaning on but the man put a hand on his shoulder. The touch felt steadying, and Neal realized that the guy was wearing an apron and a name badge: Melvin Reyes, Assistant-Manager. Melvin said something, and when he repeated it Neal managed to read his lips. "You okay?"

Neal nodded slowly, and when Melvin held out his hand Neal took it and hauled himself to his feet. He closed his eyes for a moment to steady himself against a shelf, and when he opened his eyes again the crowd had dispersed. Melvin made a beckoning motion as he walked off, and Neal followed him down the aisle and through an "employees only" door to a tiny office where Melvin waved Neal to sit down in a chair. Neal picked up a pad of paper and a pen from the desk and raised his eyebrows in question. When he got a nod of permission, Neal started writing.

**I'm sorry for the mess. I can't hear. I lost my balance.**

Melvin read the note then nodded. **Are you hurt?**

Neal had a headache, and his shoulder felt bruised from hitting the metal shelves, but that was the worst of it. He could go outside, get a cab home, but he felt exhausted and unsteady and unprepared to deal with communicating with strangers. **No. But do you mind if I wait here for a friend to meet me?**

**No problem.**

Melvin left the office, and Neal pulled his phone out with shaking hands. He knew he ought to text Mozzie, but for reasons he didn't want to examine he texted Peter instead. He asked for help and gave his location, though Peter would be able to track him by the anklet, then folded his arms and put his head down on the desk. He didn't know how a simple outing that had started so hopeful had ended in so much humiliation but he was too tired to deal with it.

Neal didn't know how long he'd been drifting in the darkness when he felt a light touch on his back and turned his head to see Peter crouched next to him. [You O-K?]

Neal wished people would stop asking him that when he was clearly a mess. He found the pen and paper again. **Will you take me home?**

Peter looked worried as he read the note but he just nodded and put his arm around Neal's back to help him up. Neal let Peter lead him out of the store to his car, which was parked in a tow-away zone out front, then sat in the passenger seat, torn between feeling embarrassed to be fetched home like an errant child and feeling terribly grateful for the rescue. Walking up the stairs to his apartment felt like a long slog, and Neal went straight to the bathroom to splash some water on his face and take a pill for his headache. 

When Neal emerged from the bathroom, he found Peter leaning against the side of his bed, holding a bottle of water and the tablet. Neal sat on the edge of the bed and took a drink from the bottle then accepted the tablet. **I guess I overdid it. I got tired, lost my balance.**

Peter frowned. **Did you hurt yourself**

Neal shrugged and pulled his shirt off then twisted to look at the bruise forming on his shoulder. **Nothing serious.**

Peter touched his palm to the sore spot, and the heat of his hand felt good. He ran his hand over Neal's head then went back to the tablet. **Your haircut looks good.**

[Thanks,] Neal signed with a hint of a smile. He wished that Peter's approval didn't feel so good.

**I need to get back to the office. Are you okay here alone?**

Neal nodded. **I just need to rest.**

Peter looked at him, something in his eyes saying that he knew it was more than the fatigue that had made Neal call him for help. He surprised Neal by wrapping him up in a hug, and Neal felt a vibration next to his head like Peter was saying something. Then, as Peter pulled back, Neal thought he felt the dry brush of lips on his temple. Maybe it was an accident, and maybe he was imagining it; he couldn't be sure because Peter turned and left without looking at Neal again. Neal climbed under the covers and remembered the comfort of Peter's arms around him to hold back the humiliation of everything that had happened earlier. He didn't want to be in a situation like that again. Never, never again.

\---

**Author's Note:**

> I wish I could have finished this. It was going to move slowly toward an OT3 relationship as Neal continued to recover and work on adapting, and he would return to work.


End file.
